<p>This is from the 2007 PSAT.</p>
<p>[Praised for] her powerful voice and soulful interpretations, Bessie Smith [had rose] to fame in the 1920s [as] America's [premier] blues singer.</p>
<p>The answer is B, "had rose". I originally put E, no error, but I just realized that it should be "had risen". Why is this? What's the difference between the forms "risen" and "rose"?</p>
<p>Someone else will be able to explain this better. I believe the sentence must be </p>
<p>Bessie Smith had risen</p>
<p>or </p>
<p>Bessie Smith rose </p>
<p>It isn’t proper grammar to say “had rose” but I can’t remember the rule… </p>
<p>I googled it and it said simple past vs. past perfect… but I don’t think people really study that stuff much within the English language, and it shouldn’t be important for the PSAT, as long as you get the answer right.</p>
<p>Because of ‘had’ you have to use the past perfect, which is risen. If had wasn’t there you could use ‘rose’ and it would mean the same thing.</p>
<p>‘Bessie Smith had rose to fame’ doesn’t even sound properl.</p>
<p>This is a past perfect tense, which is often used when we are relating two events which happened in the past. It helps to show which event happened first. This page will explain the rules for forming and using the tense. </p>
<p>“Bessie Smith had risen to fame’ doesn’t even sound properl.”</p>
<p>Got it, thanks!</p>
<p>…or it could simply be “rose”.</p>