Now that we have studied these two tenses of the past (The past perfect subjunctive and the past conditional), it is important to shed light on their close relationship. As we have seen, the past perfect (whether in indicative or in subjunctive) expresses an action that occurred in the past before another action took place. A sentence containing a verb in the past perfect subjunctive tense, and one in the past conditional, is a common construction in the Italian language. Each verb is normally in its own clause, making a two clause--or compound--sentence:
| Avrei preferito che fossi stato tu a darmi la buona notizia. I would have preferred for it to have been you to give me the good news. |