It has been a very long time coming, it must come at last.

[BestBuddy]

I recently bumped into such a sentence in an English novel by Charles Dickens, "It has been a very long time coming, it must come at last." So I tried putting it in the past tense (reducing 'must').

Which the past continuous or the past perfect continuous makes more sense here?

She was dying for a long time until she finally died.
She had been dying for a long time until she finally died.

It was a very long time coming until it came at last.
It had been a very long time coming until it came at last.

 

[jutfrank]

I'm not sure I follow what you're trying to do or why.

It has been a very long time coming.

This sentence is in the present tense, so if you want to put it in the past tense, you change has to had:

It had been a very long time coming.

However, the original sentence as a whole is written from the perspective of the present moment. I can't see how it makes much sense to try to put it into the past tense because the second clause (it must come at last) is talking about a future time from that present perspective. The whole reason for the utterance is that it hasn't come at last.

But if you want to force it, just for the sake of grammar practice, you get:

It had been a long time coming, it had to come at last.

The modal must becomes had to when backshifted into the past.

 

[BestBuddy]

I'm not sure I follow what you're trying to do or why.

My idea is to say that something(no matter what) had been in progress for a long time before it finally happened, it doesn't necessarily be the exact same sentence from a novel. I know that 'must' becomes 'had' in the past tenses.

She was dying for a long time until she finally died.
She had been dying for a long time until she finally died.

It was a very long time coming until it came at last.
It had been a very long time coming until it came at last.

 

[5jj]

She was dying for a long time until she finally died.
She had been dying for a long time until she finally died.

Neither of those is natural. They might just about work with before or when instead of until.

 

[BestBuddy]

They might just about work with before or when instead of until.

Thank you.

She was dying for a long time before/when she finally died.
She had been dying for a long time before/when she finally died.

She was dying for a long time before/when she finally died.
She had been dying for a long time before/when she finally died.

 

[jutfrank]

The past perfect works to provide background context to a past event, which is precisely what you mean to do here.

She'd been dying for a long time ...

This clause expresses the background context. That is, it provides the listener with the circumstances that led up to her death.