In all other parts of all other verbs it is identical to the bare infinitive or the normal indicative. Secondly, the subjunctive is only visible in the verb "to be", and then largely in the third person. I think that in my daily life (and my profession involves writing all styles of English) I use it perhaps once a week. But what's history got to do with it? We're learning modern English, and in its British version the subjunctive is virtually non-existent. He says "Strictly and historically, the verbs "said" and "had said". I like Scholiast's response but I still think it's too complex. This is clearly apparent from the German and Anglo-Saxon equivalents "wäre" and "waere", which differ morphologically from their indicative equivalents, "war" and "was". This is well illustrated by the reliquary subjunctive form "were" in "If I were you", which is not a past tense verb (that would be "was"), though many native speakers at least of BrE confuse them. Strictly and historically, the verbs "said" and "had said" in b1 and b2 are subjunctives, but as intolerandus is aware, these are indistinguishable in form from the past preterite and the pluperfect indicative respectively. Past (b2): If he had said this, he would have been wrong (b1): If he said this, he would be wrong (a3): If he says this, he will be wrong Past (a2): If he said this, he was wrong įut. Both real and unreal conditions may theoretically refer to present, past or future time (though the absence of a conjugated future form in English muddies the distinction between pres. The crucial distinction in conditional sentences is between "real" (or "open") conditions, in which the indicative verb is used, and "unreal" (or "counterfactual") conditions, which use a subjunctive - in modern English this is represented by the modal verb "would" in the apodosis. "Conditional" is a term which applies to clauses or sentences rather than to specific modal verb-forms: the verb-forms in question are known as "subjunctive" (or "conjunctive"). May I try to clarify things a little? I think I may be able to do so as I know both Latin and German (and some Anglo-Saxon), where the morphological patterns are more distinct than they are in modern English. Is that not accurate, Your Devastatedness? But, hey, ain't it exciting to see questions like yours - someone propounds a theory and subjects to criticism and derision anyone who dares to disagree. As regards that 3rd conditional they have described as 'past perfect subjunctive', I still say that the person who has said this is in the minority and contemporary mainstream grammar regards his example as nothing more than a regular 3rd conditional. Very well, then we could just as easily say that the past perfect subjunctive uses the third conditional form of the verbs, as in 'He wished he had been a better husband'. That is - the third conditional uses their past perfect subjunctive form. I am not impressed by the examples given on that 'grammaring' website and, besides, they say that the subjunctive form of the verbs coincides with their past perfect tense form. Pages 155 to 160 - not a single example of the subjunctive in a 3rd-conditional sentence. In his Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language he lists the following types of subjunctive: a) the mandative subjunctive, b) the formulaic subjunctive, c) other uses of the present subjunctive and d) the were-subjunctive.
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