2 Comments
User's avatar
Rob Grayson's avatar

At the risk of ruffling feathers (not my intention), I don't see subjunctives in any of the sentences cited here.

For example, in the sentence…

"…even if he had forgotten it, Mrs. Penniman would have remembered it for him"

… the first verb ("had forgotten") is in the past perfect (or pluperfect) tense and the second ("would have remembered") is in the conditional perfect.

Apparently this type of construction is known by English language learners as a "Type III conditional" (for example, see https://langeek.co/en/grammar/course/111/conditional-iii).

But again, not a subjunctive in sight.

Expand full comment
Honolulu Quirk's avatar

Good eye, Rob! I should have said that these examples demonstrate the correct use of the (single) conditional and successfully avoid the "creeping subjunctive" problem. Thanks for the very diplomatic correction. I have updated the post!

Expand full comment