The Verb. The Category of Mood

Verkhovskaya denotes mood as the grammatical category of the verb which expresses modality, i.e. the relation between the contents of a sentence and reality. The form of the finite verb in a sentence shows whether the situation described in it is real, unreal, or problematic, i.e. not certain to happen.

There are three moods in English:

1) The indicative mood;

2) The imperative mood;

3) The subjunctive mood.

Various definition of the category of mood have been given. We'll give the definition of Vinogradov: mood expresses the relation of the action to reality, as stated by the speaker.

Boris Ilyish does not agree with this definition on the whole. He notices that there are other ways of indicating the reality or possibility of an action, besides the verbal category of mood,

E.g. modal verbs (can, may, must, etc.) and modal words (perhaps, probably), but two moods are universally recognized. This is the division of moods into the one which represents an action as real (the indicative) and the second which represents it as non-real, or imaginary (conditional).

The indicative mood states facts,

E.g. The house is very close to the sea.

But one peculiarity of this category should be kept in mind: not all facts expressed by the predicate verb in the indicative mood are necessarily true. There can be the possibility that the speaker is mistaken or telling a lie. We should keep in mind that theoretical grammar does not deal with the ultimate truth. What is essential from the grammatical point of view is the meaning of the category. One more peculiarity about the category of the indicative mood is the question of a peculiar model character of the future indicative as distinct from the present or past indicative,

E.g. I will speak to him if I meet him.

The imperative mood is represented by one form only,

E.g. Come!

without any suffix or ending. It differs from all other moods in several important points: it has no person, number, tense, or aspect distinctions and it is limited to one type of sentence only (imperative sentences). Most usually a verb in the imperative has no pronoun acting as subject. It is very rare in emotional sentences, speech only,

E.g. You, leave me alone!

A serious difficulty connected with the imperative is the absence of any specific morphological characteristics. With all verbs including the verb 'be' it coincides with the infinitive.

The subjunctive mood

The chief difficulty analysis has to face here is the absence of a mutual relation between meaning and form. Sometimes the same series of signs will have two (even more) different meanings depending on factors lying outside the form itself and outside the meaning of the verb. Sometimes the same modal meaning will be expressed by two different series of external signs,

E.g. The first point may be illustrated by the example 'We should come' (I think we should come here again tomorrow) - here it is an equivalent to 'We ought to come'.

'If we knew that he wants to see us we should come to see him'. 'Should come' here denotes a conditional action, i.e. an action depends on certain conditions.

Matters are still further complicated by two phenomena where we are faced with the choice with a choice between polysemy and homonymy,

E.g. the forms like 'lived', 'knew' may appear in two types of contexts:

He lived here five years ago.

If he lived here he would come at once.

If I knew his address I should write to him.

In the first type of sentences it is the past tense of the indicative mood and in two other examples the forms are the forms of some other mood, which only happen to be homonymous with forms of the past indicative, but they are basically different.

The forms 'should go' and 'would go' are also used in different contexts,

E.g. I said I should go at once (it is future in the past).

I should go if I knew the place (it is subjunctive).

Whom should I need but him? (the question which arises here is this: is the group 'should/would go' in both cases the same form with the meaning changed according to the syntactic context, so that one context favours the temporal meaning (future in the past) and the other - a modal meaning (a mood of some sort differing from the indicative).

The problem of polysemy and homonymy with reference to such forms as 'knew', 'lived', or 'should come', 'would come' and the like is very hard one to solve. All these considerations make the problem of mood in Modern English extremely difficult to solve.

Owing to the difference of approach to moods, grammarians have been vesselating between two extremes: three moods (indicative, subjunctive, imperative) put forward by many grammarians and sixteen moods as proposed by Deutschbein. Between these extremes there are intermediate views, such as that of professor Smirnitsky who proposed a system of six moods (indicative, imperative, subjunctive one, subjunctive two, suppositional and conditional) and who was followed by this respect by Ganshina and Vasilevskaya. The problem of English moods was also investigated by professor Vorontsova and by a number of other scholars.

According to Reznik, there are four principal forms of the subjunctive mood in English:

1) I/he should go/should be present;

2) I/he go(es)/be present;

3) I/he would go/be present;

4) I/he went/were present.

The main difference between subjunctive forms one and two, and subjunctive moods three and four is the degree of probability. Subjunctive forms one and two are used to present events as probable, though problematic. Subjunctive moods three and four present them as purely imaginary or contrary to fact.

The choice between forms of the subjunctive moods also depends upon the type of the sentence (clause) in which the form is used. Subjunctive one (I/he should go) is widely used in different structures: in complex sentences, in subject, object, predicative, or attributive clauses, also clauses of condition and concession; in simple, or compound sentences,

E.g. It is suggested that he should come (subject clause).

I suggest that he should come (object clause).

The suggestion was that he should come (a predicative clause).

The suggestion that he should come was quite unexpected (an attributive clause).

If he should come, I shall be very happy (a clause of condition).

Even if he should come, I shall be very happy (a clause of concession).

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Subjunctive form two 'I/he go' is rather restricted in its use. It will be found in subordinate nominal clauses mainly subject or object in the clause of object,

E.g. It is suggested that you will come here soon (subject clause).

I suggest that you will come here soon (object clause).

Subjunctive form three 'I/he would come' is mainly used in the principal clause of a complex sentence containing a clause of condition, concession in a simple or compound sentence,

E.g. If he came here, they would be very happy (it is a complex sentence with a clause of condition).

Even if he came here, they wouldn't be very happy (it is a complex sentence with a clause of concession).

He would come with pleasure (it is a simple sentence).

He would come with pleasure, but he can't (it is a compound sentence).

Subjunctive form four 'I/he came' is used rather widely in complex sentences, mainly in subject or complex clauses, or in clause of condition, concession, comparison and sometimes in simple sentences,

E.g. It's time he came here (subject clause).

I wish he came here more often (object clause).

If he came here more often, they would be very happy (clause of condition).

He seems as if he came here rather often (predicative clause).

Even if he came here more often, they wouldn't be very happy (clause of concession).

He seems quite familiar with the place, as if he came here very often (clause of comparison).

Oh, if he came here more often! (a simple sentence)

Groups which ought not to be classed under modal categories

Among these we must mention first the groups 'let me go', 'let us go' and 'let him go', i.e. the patterns 'let + personal pronoun (in the objective case) or noun (in the common case) + infinitive which may be used to denote':

1) A decision of the first person singular (i.e. of the speaker himself) to commit an action;

2) An appeal to the first person plural to commit an action together with the speaker;

3) An appeal to the third person (singular or plural) to commit some action.

Boris Ilyish thinks that groups of this structure can't be recognized as analytical forms of the imperative. They belong to syntax. The imperative mood is represented by the second person forms only.

Mood and tense

An independence between mood and tense which has a much wider meaning may be found if we analyze the system of tenses together with that of moods. In no other mood we can find the same system of tenses as in the indicative mood. It is the indicative mood which is used to represent real actions, and it is such actions that are described by exact temporal characteristics. As to those actions which do not take place in reality, but are thought as possible, desirable, etc., they would not require a detailed time characteristics.

Time is essentially objective, while all moods, except the indicative, are subjective.

We have here forms of the indicative mood in a special use.