One of the most fascinating things about language is that we can use it so well, so expertly, without understanding how we do it. The following two sentences are perfect examples. If the burglar was ...

Grammatically, the subjunctive is a verb mood, not a verb tense. Most sentences use the indicative mood; the subjunctive in English has fairly restricted uses. Often, subjunctive forms don't look any ...

In a recent TED Talk, Phuc Tran talks about his love for grammar, particularly the use of the subjunctive and indicative. He uses these two types of verbal moods as a tool to look at the world and one ...

I begin this lesson on a difficult grammatical concept called the “subjunctive mood” with a memory of one of the first pornographic films I ever saw. It was called “The Secret Lives of Romeo and ...

“If there were a Form 3, you would have already filled it out.” Reader Jessica had a question about a sentence like this. The speaker already knew about a Form 1 and a Form 2. The existence of Form 3, ...

For grammar bullies “the subjunctive” is sacred ground. Reforms proposed for the British national curriculum in 2012 required teaching use of the subjunctive not later than sixth grade. People seem to ...

READING a story on the fate of European newspapers, your columnist was drowning in bad news—newsrooms decimated, advertisers fleeing—but then a strange sentence appeared: Even Rupert Murdoch, who ...

I mean Nevermore, of course, the pet raven and mascot of the Coffee Guzzlers Club. There he was, munching down the last of the Sam 'n' Ella Cafe's buttermilk biscuit. (And he actually conned a member ...