Dear friend, normally, the subjunctive were follows as if/as though : He spoke as if she were dead. However, the ordinary present tense is required where the emphasis is on truth rather than falsity : It's not as if he' s dishonest (= he

Here's how it should be: Jackson would have celebrated his fiftieth birthday this August if he were alive . Jackson would have celebrated his fiftieth birthday this August if he had not died earlier this year . There are a

It can be put in present perfect and past perfect using "if" like this: If the train have already left , we shall/will take the next train. (formal present perfect subjunctive) If the train had already left , we should/would

Now if I look up "are," the dictionary tells me that it is the present plural of "be." But what I would expect is that it would tell me that it is the present plural of "am" or "is" because those are the

Had is a past subjunctive in your sentence. For a continuous or progressive tense as they are also called, you always need the present participle, i.e. a verb ending ing: I am hav ing dinner at the moment. He was read ing a book when I called

I'm still somewhat confused regarding the subjunctive mood. Suppose we are talking about two different people, two "hes", is this correct? (1) He is rich, and he wishes he were rich. (2) He was rich, and he wishes he

Hi, Pernickety. I agree that the meanings of "suggest" in the two examples are quite different, but I wouldn't exactly describe the distinction as "fine." I agree that in the "came" example, "suggest"

Hi. Could you please show the example of infinitive that you refer to? In #1, I take "come" as subjunctive, referring to the future. I take "came" as a suggestion about what might have happened in the past. It sounds a bit

I profess that I am a thief. Okay, but "confess" would be more common. To acknowledge I profess like a father. My American Heritage gives this meaning (intransitive), but I've never heard it. There are common religious meanings,

"If you knew what I had gone through, you would surely pity me." Tashiro: Your sentence is in present tense, subjunctive mood. The following is the same sentence, but changed to past tense, subjunctive mood: If you had known what I had