Subjunctive mood elucidation

Question

Is it grammatically correct to express oneself in subjunctive mood (with the latter to be viewed as a conjunction for its indicative correlative indeed) as follows?

"Been I rich, poor yet am I today."
"Rich have I been, poor yet am I today."
"Rich may I have been, poor yet am I today."

Namely is it appropriate to utilise "been I..." or "...have I been" as opposed to "Rich may I have been rich" as a conjugation for the past in subjunctive mood?

The sentence is to convey the occurrence of a present, ongoing, event in spite of a past eventuality which might have or might not have realised itself.

And, all in all, how many tenses do there exist in the subjunctive mood: 3 or 4?

Present - Past - Past Participle and In-between Past Participle?

Present as in: be I be you be he be we be they.
Past participle as in: been I been you been he been we been they.
Past as in: were I were you were he were we were they.
In-between Past participle as in: had I been had you been had he been had we been had they been.

Beholden

AlpheccaStars · Accepted Answer

"Been I rich, poor yet am I today." Ungrammatical.
"Rich have I been, though I am poor yet am I today." This is not subjunctive mood. The first clause is a cleft structure, and quite old-fashioned.
" I may have been rich, but / though I am poor today." This isn't subjunctive mood.
Be we rich or poor, we will still in be in love. The first clause is subjunctive, but it is hardly used in current English.
He demanded that we be present at the meeting. The dependent clause is subjunctive mood. This structure is still in common use.

The subjunctive mood has been depreciated in modern English. If you want to see more usage of the subjunctive then you have to go back to Early Modern English or before.

Anonymous · Answer

I joined this website today, searched several topics and found myself of this Subjunctive Mood thread (if threads are indeed what these postings are collectively referred to). My first introduction to the subjunctive mood was the 8th or 9th grade in my 1st year Latin class. I appreciated this learning and increased awareness of the subjunctive for precisely the reasons that AlpheccaStars attributes to its obsolescence; i.e., the old fashioned, unusually and seldom heard nature of this form of communication. I remember so many sentences when translated from Latin to English seemed to have this general form of blah, blah, blah, in order that he might be able to blah, blah, blah and would insert something similar into my conversations occasionally. Finally, I remember from my college days a good friend but tennis nemesis who often irritated me on the court and to whom I once said something to the effect of "I would had that ball crossed the net such that I might have been able to smash it down your throat" (all in good fun). All these years later, I have wondered if the ...would had... part was at least technically an appropriate use of the subjunctive case. Thanks, Mark.

CalifJim · Answer

AnonymousNamely is it appropriate to utilise "been I..." or "...have I been" as opposed to "Rich may I have been rich" as a conjugation for the past in subjunctive mood?

No. None of those can be said to a modern-day speaker of English without eliciting a puzzled stare or nervous laughter.

Anonymoushow many tenses do there exist in the subjunctive mood

The subjunctive in English is so different from the subjunctive in other languages that some of us don't even think of it as subjunctive. For the purposes of learning English it is much better to think of the subjunctive simply as a few "constructions", not really "tenses", and their variants.

1. "mandative" construction: the use of the bare infinitive ("plain form") after certain verbs, nouns, and adjectives.

demand(ed), insist(ed), recommend(ed), important, urgent, ... (THAT) ... [plain form] ...

I insisted that he take the medicine immediately.
We urge that these students be reprimanded for their behavior.
I could not agree to the requirement that she wait half an hour before being served.

This construction is not used in if-clauses in modern English: If I be late, go without me is not correct in today's English.

Variant: Add 'should'. I insisted that he should take the medicine immediately.

2. "unreal" construction: the substitution of 'were' for 'was' in a past-tense if-clause accompanied by a 'would' clause or its equivalent. The substitution is optional in many varieties of English, especially in the spoken form.

If I were you (not was you), I would sell the car.
If Jack were here (not was here), he could solve this problem in no time.
People would be much happier if the bridge were repaired (not was repaired).

Variant: Omit if and invert: Were he here, he would help instead of If he were here, he would help.

CJ

Grammarfreak · Answer

Perfectly explained. That's the way, I understand it.<img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/21.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/21.gif' alt='Emotion: yes'/>

Subjunctive mood elucidation

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