Word
Ich hatte verschlafen, deshalb war ich zu spät.
Meaning
I had overslept, therefore I was late.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Ich hatte verschlafen, deshalb war ich zu spät.
ich
I
sein
to be
haben
to have
zu
too (e.g., too big)
Questions & Answers about Ich hatte verschlafen, deshalb war ich zu spät.
Why is it hatte verschlafen instead of habe verschlafen?
hatte verschlafen is the Past Perfect tense (Plusquamperfekt). You use it when you are talking about a past event (being late) and need to mention something that happened even earlier (oversleeping). It is built with the simple past of haben (hatte) plus the past participle, just like in English: 'I had overslept.'
Why doesn't the past participle verschlafen start with ge-?
Verbs that start with the inseparable prefix ver- never take a ge- in the past participle. Because of this rule, the infinitive verschlafen (to oversleep) and the past participle verschlafen (overslept) happen to look exactly the same here.
Why is the word order deshalb war ich and not deshalb ich war?
deshalb (therefore) is an adverb, not a coordinating conjunction like und or aber. When an adverb takes the first position in a clause, the verb (war) must stay in the strict second position, which pushes the subject (ich) into the third position.
Is it also possible to use kommen to express being late here?