By Negatives, Subjunctives

Subjunctive.to be:Present affirmative:I be / you be / he, she, it be / we be / you be / they bePresent negative:I not be / you not be / he, she, it not be / we not be / you not be / they not be Past affirmative (negative):I were (not) / you were (not) / he, she, it were (not) / we were (not) /...

I seem to have noticed that, when the object is not a person, "would rather" is often followed by the subjunctive mood instead of the simple past or the pluperfect. For instance, we say "I'd rather you joined me", but I rarely see: "I'd rather the meeting was...

I think NO. It is a subjunctive tense form--which simply means hypothetical. For example: If it rains tomorrow, I should wear a hat, does not mean it will or won't rain. While your senence has the feel of the negative, it does not state it. mr steve

Hello Agnliholic. The use of the subjunctive ("as if she were") adds emphasis to one of the meanings of "act" (theater, stage = pretend). So yes, it could be pretend in the sentence with the following consequences: the reader could easily imagine "pretend compliance" with the commands of our...

Hi AnonYour negative subjunctive looks good to me.

Loojka wrote:Both can be correct, depending on what you're trying to say.I would give anything that she 'asked' me to. - I would give anything that she wanted me to.I would give anything if she asked me to. (condition emphasized) I would not give anything, unless she asked me to.This explanation...

I do see your point, though. You have a situation with two features that are problematic: a negative condition and a mixed conditional. That is, the if clause has a not and is in past time, and the main clause is in present time. These didn't for hadn't substitutes are more likely to...

My question is "If a sentence contains 'didn't + something' in the if-clause, it should not be a subjunctive?"I'm lost by your use of "should". There's nothing to be done in terms of what one should or should not do. didn't is simply a non-standard substitute subjunctive for the standard...

Your sentences are not very good English as they contain grammatical mistakes. If I understand you right, you are asking whether need not + infinitive is a subjunctive. No, it isn't. Need in the present tense can be made negative in two ways:1. He need not go there.2. He doesn't need/have to go...

Hello Believer,This discussion really is redundant since there are very few living instances in English where the subjuctive and the indicative take different forms (and many people even want to dispute those).If you were to look at language like Spanish1 which does have a living subjunctive you...