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The Category of Mood

The meaning of this category is the attitude of the speaker or writer towards the content of the sent-ce. It is expressed in the form of the verb.

There are 3 moods in English – the Indicative Mood, the Imperative Mood, and the Subjunctive Mood.

The Indicative Mood indicates that what is said must be regarded as a fact, as smth, which has occurred or is occurring at the moment of speaking or will occur in the future. It may denote actions with different time-reference and different aspective characteristics. Therefore the ind. mood has a wide variety of tense & aspect forms in the active & passive voice.

The Imperative Mood expresses a command or a request to perform an action addressed to smbd, but not the action itself. As it does not actually denote a specific action it has no tense category: the action always refers to the future. Aspect distinctions & voice distinctions are not characteristic of the Imperative Mood; although forms such as be writing, be warned sometimes occur.

The Imperative Mood coincides with the plain stem of the verb, for ex.:

Come here! Sit down!

The negative form is built by means of the auxiliary do

Do not take it away!

Don’t worry about the child!

Don’t be a fool!

Note: Do is also used in commands or requests to make them more emphatic:

Do come and stay with us.

Do be quiet.

In commands & requests addressed to a third person or persons the analytical form let…+infinitive is used. When the person addressed is denoted by a personal pronoun, it is used in the objective case.

Let us go together.

Let him finish his dinner first.

Let Andrew do it himself.

In negative sentences the analytical forms take the particle not without an auxiliary.

Let us not argue the matter.

Let him not over estimate his chances.

Let her not go any further.

Note: In sentences like Don’t let him do the negation refers to the verb let which in this case fully retains its original meaning of permission.

The analytical forms differ in meaning from the synthetic forms, because their meaning is closely connected with the meaning of the pronoun included in the form. Thus let us do something denotes an invitation to a joint action, not an order, or a request. Let us do it retains to some extent the meaning of permission.

Note: In the form let me (let me do it) the first person singular does not convey any imperative meaning and should not therefore be regarded as the imperative. It conveys the meaning of I am eager to do it, allow me to do it.

The imperative mood is used only in imperative sentences and can’t be used in questions.

There are following moods in English:

1. the direct moods (the Indicative, the Imperative)

2. the Oblique Moods (Subjunctive I, Subjunctive II, the Suppositional & the Conditional Moods)

The Oblique Moods

Its function is to represent something in the speaker’s mind not as a real fact but as a wish, purpose, supposition, doubt, or condition.

It is the category of the verb, which is used to express unreal, or hypothetical actions or states. A hypothetical action or state may be viewed upon as desired, necessary, possible, supposed, imaginary, or contradicting reality.

There are four Oblique Moods in English:

1. the Conditional Mood

2. the Suppositional Mood

3. Subjunctive I

4. Subjunctive II

1,2 – analytical

3,4 – synthetical