Superlatives + Perfect

[Anonymous]

Dear Teacher,

My name is Evgeniya, I live and work as translator/interpreter in Russia and I have the following question:

With the superlatives we often use the Present Perfect Tense:
The best book I have read this month is ...

Should we use the Past Perfect Tense if we are talking about a dead person:

The best book Faulkner had written ... or should we just use the past simple: he wrote?

Thank you in advance.

Best regards,

Evgeniya

My e-mail is ekantor@mail.ru

 

[MikeNewYork]

Dear Teacher,

My name is Evgeniya, I live and work as translator/interpreter in Russia and I have the following question:

With the superlatives we often use the Present Perfect Tense:
The best book I have read this month is ...

Should we use the Past Perfect Tense if we are talking about a dead person:

The best book Faulkner had written ... or should we just use the past simple: he wrote?

Thank you in advance.

Best regards,

Evgeniya

My e-mail is ekantor@mail.ru

There would be times when either would be appropriate.

We use the present perfect in these constructions, because the person is presumably not finished yet.

That is the best book I have read (to date).

Once a person has died, he is presumably finished reading or writing anything. The simple past will usually work. The past perfect would be used to set the action back before another action in the past -- including the author's death.