Past tenses

‘Strove’ is the simple past. ‘Striven’ is the past participle, as in ‘has striven’, ‘had striven’ or e.g ‘would have striven...’

I have always used I strive, I strove, and I have striven and can't really see the problem, as we all say I drive, I drove and I have driven,

All languages have stong, or irregular verbs, and most of us learnt them by heart in all other languages than our native tongue.

How about smelled or smelt. ? I can’t decide.

Both are correct, but “Strove” is more popular.
Let´s look at Google Ngram Viewer tool which displays a graph showing how phrases have occurred in a corpus of books over the years.

Source: en.learniv.com/info/en/irregular-verbs/strived-or-strove-what-is-correct-and-how-to-use-it/

Elegran - yes, someone drove me, gave me a lift, so I was passively driven

Ah well, Elegran, the compliment stands!!

So you were using "was driven" as the verb in the past tense, passive voice, not just "driven" - the past participle, which is a part of that past tense of the verb?

Sorry to be so pedantic (but this is Pedants' corner, it is permitted)

BTW, alea, my education was English up until the age of 16 or so - starting with a very small army school, then a primary school in working-class Brighton, then LA grammar school- Varndean - in the 50s (where most of the teachers were elderly women who had returned to fill vacancies when the men were off to war.)

It was because I was comparing striven with driven, eg I was driven.
Too complicated for me!

If it was the passive voice, you would be saying the equivalent of "I have been striven" which is nonsense. You can strive, but you can't strive someone or something else (that is the non-technical version of Alea's transitive and non-transitive verbs, for those who were looking out of the window at that lesson)

You can be driven because drive can be either a transitive or intransitive verb - "I drive a Porsche" - transitive, or "I drive every day" - intransitive.

And in case "every day" confuses, that is not the object of the verb.

Fell at the final hurdle, my iPad has apparently NEVER heard of a Scottish EDUCATION

I don't see how you can suggest to use "striven" is anything to do with the passive voice TriciaF. It is an intransitive verb , so takes no object, therefore can only be used in the active voice,
"Striven" is indeed the past participle and not only foreign students of English would know that!!

"strive" vb intrans, past strove, past participle striven"

It's not really all that complicated
And Elegran said it all back at 12.34 Dare I suggest the benefits of a Scottish and duration?

Your loth isn't wrong, it's just an even older spelling.

www.thefreedictionary.com/loath

You can consider yourself even more truly archaic!

Janerowena - How about loth, or am I getting it mixed up with sloth. I loathed something but also I am loth to do x.You are prob right with loath. Need to look it up.

And 'strove'

Reading through I don't think I've ever used the word. Perhpas I don't strive enough!

Granjura is right. Foreign students especially those taking the Cambridge Advanced certificate of English will have learned striven.

Alea

I won't be shriven, I'll be fat!!

Hey how about "shrive"?
I make pancakes on Shrove Tuesday because by Ash Wednesday I will be shriven

I wouldn't refer to these as irregular verbs , but rather "strong, weak and mixed" verbs. Many English native speakers are not aware that ther are categories, but German speakers in particular recognise patterns of vowel changes.
We are so illogical though,
I drink, I drank but I have drunk.
I swim, I swam, I have swum
And then we get
I think, I thank thought I have thunk (oops) thought!

I was thinking about 'strive' and 'drive'

I suppose you can say 'I strived to achieve a reasonable speed'
But not 'I drived at a reasonable speed'

(ooh, both strived and drived are underlined in red!)

Strive is similar to drive.
We say "I was driven" or "I drove." Also "driven" describing somone who is fanatical.
Looks like striven could be the passive form?
So I would say the simple past is strove. Rather archaic.

As foreign students of English we had to learn looooooong lists of irregular verbs as threesome, 'see, saw, seen', 'strive, strove, striven', etc, etc, etc,

And of course what is acceptable in the USA is not in the UK- which grammar is correct, got or gotten?

It is a delight to hear natives struggling with this- I'll tell my 14/15 year old French and Swiss students- they will be tickled pink at that!

He has/had been striving.

Shakespeare used both strived and striven. I reckon you can use either.