THE OTHER MOODS

Now we come to a very difficult set of problems, namely those connected with the subjunctive, conditional, or whatever other name we may choose to give these moods.

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

The first of these two points may be illustrated by the sequence we should come, which means one thing in the sentence I think we should come here again to-morrow (here we should come is equivalent to we ought to come); it means another thing in the sentence If we knew that he wants us we should come to see him (here we should come denotes a conditional action, i. e. an action depending on certain conditions), and it means another thing again in the sentence How queer that we should come at the very moment when you were talking about us! (here we should come denotes an action, which has actually taken place and which is considered as an object for comment). In a similar way, several meanings may be found in the sequence he would come in different contexts.

The second of the two points may be illustrated’ by comparing the two sentences, I suggest that he go and I suggest that he should go, and we will for the present neglect the fact that the first of the-two variants is more typical of American, and the second of British English.

It is quite clear, then, that we shall arrive at different systems; of English moods, according as we make our classification depend on the meaning (in that case one should come will find its place under one heading, and the other should come under another, whereas (he) go and (he) should go will find their place under the same heading) or on form (in that case he should come will fall under one heading, no matter in what context it may be used, while (he) go and (he) should go will fall under different, headings).

This difficulty appears to be one of the main sources of that wide devergence of views which strikes every reader of English grammars when he reaches the chapter on moods.

It is natural to suppose that a satisfactory solution may be found by combining the two approaches (that based on meaning and that based on form) in some way or other. But here again we are faced with difficulties when we try to determine the exact way in which they should be combined. Shall we start with criteria based on meaning and first establish the main categories on this principle, and then subdivide each of these categories according to formal criteria, and in this way arrive at the final smallest units in the sphere of mood? Or shall we proceed in the opposite way and start with formal divisions, etc.? All these are questions which can only be answered in a more or less arbitrary way, so that a really binding solution cannot be expected on these lines. Whatever system of moods we may happen to arrive at, it will always be possible for somebody else to say that a different solution is also conceivable and perhaps better than the one we have proposed.

Matters are still further complicated by two phenomena where we are faced with a choice between polysemy and homonymy. One of these concerns forms like lived, knew, etc. Such forms appear in two types of contexts, of which one may be exemplified by the sentences, He lived here five years ago, or I knew it all along, and the other by the sentences, If he lived here he would come at once, or, If I knew his address I should write to him.

In sentences of the first type the form obviously is the past tense of the indicative mood. The second type admits of two interpretations: either the forms lived, knew, etc. are the same forms of the past indicative that were used in the first type, but they have acquired another meaning in this particular context, or else the forms lived, knew, etc. are forms of some other mood, which only happen to be homonymous with forms of the past indicative but are basically different.

The other question concerns forms like (I) should go, (he) would go. These are also used in different contexts, as may be seen from the following sentences: I said I should go at once, I should go if I knew the place, Whom should I meet but him, etc.

The question which arises here is this: is the group (he) would go in both cases the same form, with its 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; we will not go now into details about what mood this should be), or are they homonyms, that is, two basically different forms which happen to coincide in sound?

The problem of polysemy or homonymy with reference to such forms as knew, lived, or should come, would come, and the like is a very hard one to solve. It is surely no accident that the solutions proposed for it have been so widely varied.

Having, then, before us this great accumulation of difficulties and of problems to which contradictory solutions have been proposed without any one author being able to prove his point in such a way that everybody would have to admit his having proved it, we must now approach this question: what way of analysing the category of mood in Modern English shall we choose if we are to achieve objectively valid results, so far as this is at all possible?

There is another peculiar complication in the analysis of mood. The question is, what verbs are auxiliaries of mood in Modern English? The verbs should and would are auxiliaries expressing unreality (whatever system of moods we may adopt after all). But the question is less clear with the verb may when used in such sentences as Come closer that I may hear what you say (and, of course, the form might if the main clause has a predicate verb in a past tense). Is the group may hear some mood form of the verb hear, or is it a free combination of two verbs, thus belonging entirely to the field of syntax, not morphology? The same question may be asked about the verb may in such sentences as May you be happy! where it is part of a group used to express a wish, and is perhaps a mood auxiliary. We ought to seek an objective criterion which would enable us to arrive at a convincing conclusion.

Last of all, a question arises concerning the forms traditionally named the imperative mood, i.e. forms like come in the sentence Come here, please! or do not be in the sentence Do not be angry with him, please! The usual view that they are mood forms has recently been attacked on the ground that their use in sentences is rather different from that of other mood forms.

All these considerations, varied as they are, make the problem of mood in Modern English extremely difficult to solve and they seem to show in advance that no universally acceptable solution can be hoped for in a near future. Those proposed so far have been extremely unlike each other. Owing to the difference of approach to moods, grammarians have been vacillating between two extremes – 3 moods (indicative, subjunctive and imperative), put forward by many grammarians, and 16 moods, as proposed by M.Deutschbein. Between these extremes there are intermediate views, such as that of Prof. A.Smirnitsky, who proposed a system of 6 moods (indicative, imperative, subjunctive I, subjunctive II, suppositional, and conditional), and who was followed in this respect by M.Ganshina and N.Vasilevskaya. The problem of English moods was also investigated by Prof. G.Vorontsova and by a number of other scholars.

In view of this extreme variety of opinions and of the fact that each one of them has something to be said in its favour (the only one, perhaps, which appears to be quite arbitrary and indefensible is that of M.Deutschbein) it would be quite futile for us here either to assert that any one of those systems is the right one, or to propose yet another, and try to defend it against all possible objections which might be raised. We will therefore content ourselves with pointing out the main possible approaches and trying to assess their relative force and their weak points.

If we start from the meanings of the mood forms (leaving aside the meaning of reality, denoted by the indicative), we obtain (with some possible variations of detail) the following headings:

We would thus get either four moods (if possibility, unreal condition, and consequence of unreal condition are each taken separately), or three moods (if any two of these are taken together), or two moods (if they are all three taken together under the heading of «non-real action»). The choice between these variants will remain arbitrary and is unlikely ever to be determined by means of any objective data.

If, on the other hand, we start from the means of expressing: moods (both synthetical and analytical) we are likely to get something like this system:

In this way we should obtain a different system, comprising six moods, with the following meanings:

(1) Inducement

(2) Possibility

(3) Unreal condition

(4) Unlikely condition

(5) Consequence of unreal condition

(6) Wish or purpose

Much additional light could probably be thrown on the whole vexed question by strict application of modern exact methods of language analysis. However, this task remains yet to be done.

We will now turn our attention to those problems of polysemy or homonymy which have been stated above.

It would seem that some basic principle should be chosen here before we proceed to consider the facts. Either we shall be ready to accept homonymy easily, rather than admit that a category having a definite meaning can, under certain circumstances, come to be used in a different meaning; or we shall avoid homonymy as far as possible, and only accept it if all other attempts to explain the meaning and use of a category have failed. The choice between these two procedures will probably always remain somewhat arbitrary, and the solution of a problem of this kind is bound to have a subjective element about it.

Let us now assume that we shall avoid homonymy as far as possible and try to keep the unity of a form in its various uses.

The first question to be considered here is that about forms of the type lived and knew. The question is whether these forms, when used in subordinate clauses of unreal condition, are the same forms that are otherwise known as the past indefinite indicative, or whether they are different forms, homonymous with the past indefinite.

If we take the view stated above, the lived and knew forms will be described in the following terms:

They are basically forms of the past tense indicative. This is their own meaning and they actually have this meaning unless some specified context shows that the meaning is different. These possible contexts have to be described in precise terms so that no room remains for doubts and ambiguities. They should be represented as grammatical patterns (which may also include some lexical items).

Pattern No. 1 (for the lived or knew forms having a meaning different from the past indicative):

Appearing in this context a form of the lived or knew type de­notes an unreal action in the present or future.

Pattern No. 2 (for the same meaning):

Appearing in this context, too, a form of the lived or knew type denotes an unreal action in the present.

Pattern No. 3 (for the same meaning):

We cannot give here a complete list of patterns. However, such a list is necessary if the conditions of a peculiar application of the lived or knew forms are to be made clear.

We might also take the view that wherever a difference in meaning is found we have to deal with homonyms. In that case we should say that there are two homonymous lived forms: lived is the past indicative of the verb live, and lived is its present subjunctive (or whatever we may call it). The same, of course, would apply to knew and to all other forms of this kind. However, this would not introduce any change into the patterns stated above. We should only have to change the heading, and to say that, for example, Pattern. No. 1 shows the conditions under which lived or knew is the form of the present subjunctive. It becomes evident here that the difference between the two views affect the interpretation of gram­matical phenomena, rather than the phenomena themselves.

A similar problem concerns the groups «should + infinitive» and «would + infinitive». Two views are possible here. If we have decided to avoid homonymy as far as possible, we will say that a group of this type is basically a tense (the future-in-the-past), which under certain specified conditions may express an unreal action – the consequence of an unfulfilled condition.

The patterns in which this is the case would seem to be the following (we will give only two of them):

Pattern No. 1

Pattern No. 2:

As a third pattern, it would be necessary to give the sentences in which there is no subordinate clause, e.g. I should be very glad to see him. Here, however, the distinction between the temporal and the modal meaning is a matter of extreme subtlety and no doubt many lexical peculiarities would have to be taken into account. Es­pecially in the so-called represented speech the conditions for the one and the other meaning to be realized are very intricate, as will be seen from the following extract: To the end of her life she would remember again the taste of the fried egg sandwich on her tongue, could bite again into the stored coolness of the apple she picked up from the red heap on a trestle table. ...She would never again see the country round Laurence Vernon’s home as she saw it the first time with Roy. (R.WEST) A variety of factors, both grammatical arid lexical, go to show that the meaning hero is that of the future-in-the-past. Compare: But Isabelle could do nothing, she and Marc had been brought by the Bourges, who were now murmuring frenetically, that they would feel better at the Sporting Club (Idem), where it is hard to tell which meaning is preferable.

If we endorse the other view, that is, if we take the temporal and the modal groups «should (would) + infinitive» to be homonyms, the patterns themselves will not change. The change will affect the headings. We shall have to say, in that case, that the patterns serve to distinguish between two basically different forms sounding alike. Again, just as in the case of lived and knew, this will be a matter of interpreting facts, rather than of the facts as such.

B.Ilyish, The Structure of Modern English, p. 114-122

Date: 2015-02-28; view: 724