The Subjunctive Mood

§ 1. The Subjunctive Mood shows that the action or state expressed by the verb ispresented as a non-fact, as something imaginary or desired. The Subjunctive Mood is also used to express an emotional attitude of the speaker, to real facts. (A detailed treatment of this use of the Subjunctive Mood is given in § 16.)

In Modern English the Subjunctive Mood has synthetic and analytical forms.

“I wish I were ten years older,” I said. (Braine)

«Хотел бы я быть на десять лет старше», — сказал я.

I wish you would speak rationally. (E. Bronte)

Я хотел бы, чтобы вы говорили разумно.

§ 2. The synthetic forms of the Subjunctive Mood can be traced to theOld English period when the Subjunctive Mood was chiefly expressed by synthetic, forms. In Old English the Subjunctive Mood had a special set of inflections, different from those of the Indicative.

In course of time most of the inflections were lost and the difference between the forms of the Subjunctive and those of the Indicative has almost disappeared. However, in Modern English there are a few synthetic forms of the Subjunctive which have survived; they are as follows: the Present Subjunctive of all the verbs and the Past Subjunctive only of the verb to be.

The Present Subjunctive