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I learn pluperfect in German and recently ran into a web-page with English-German examples. One of the example seems to me incorrect, so I am bringing this out to make sure I correctly understand the English grammar.

The sentence:

I had already spoken Chinese as a child, but now I wanted to learn German.

seems to me grammatically incorrect because of now instead of then I strongly believe there must be then there, because now cannot be used in the past. Am I right or wrong? Is there any example of now in the past?

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    Yes, it's normal to use 'now' when referring to a time in the past in relation to an earlier time. – Kate Bunting May 30 '18 at 15:11
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    Possible duplicate of Can we use "Now" (not until now or until then) in past tense sentences – Jason Bassford May 30 '18 at 16:34
  • Neither language would use the pluperfect because the two facts have no relation to each other. It's a poor example. – KarlG May 30 '18 at 16:34
  • 'I had already spoken Chinese as a child' sounds unidiomatic per se. 'I spoke Chinese as a child, ...' or 'I had learned Chinese as a child, ...'. – Edwin Ashworth May 30 '18 at 19:00
  • The question suggested as a duplicate of this one has a very similarly worded header, but the specific usage of now that the poster there asks about seems quite different from the specific usage that the poster here asks about. – Sven Yargs Jun 1 '18 at 4:27

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