I am writing a text on theatre. I would like to put in one sentence two different time references:
"The model has recently been popular in the academia"
AND
"It was theorized about 50 years ago by X"
The sentence would go along the lines of:
"What has recently been popular in the academia was/had already been theorized about 50 years ago by X"
I'm wondering whether I should use the Past Simple form as there are no 2 different past reference points or the Past Perfect form - since 50 years is a long time and I would like to emphasize the fact.