Oblique moods

MOOD is the form of the verb, which shows in what relation to reality the speaker places the action expressed by the predicate verb. There are the following moods in English:

THE INDICATIVE MOOD presents actions as real facts in the present, past or future. Indicative mood forms distinguish the categories of tense (present, past, future), aspect (common, continuous), correlation (non-perfect, perfect), voice (active, passive), number and person.

THE IMPERATIVE MOOD expresses a command of a request to perform an action addressed to somebody, but not the action itself. The Imperative Mood has practically only one form, which coincides with the stem of the verb (e.g. Do. Begin).

THE OBLIQUE MOODS express unreal (hypothetical) or problematic actions. Unreal actions are those contradicting reality; problematic actions may be viewed as desired, necessary, possible, supposed, imaginary, etc.

There are different forms of the verb employed for this purpose, and they may be grouped as Subjunctive I, Subjunctive II, the Conditional Mood and the Suppositional Mood. Subjunctive II and the Conditional Mood express unreal (hypothetical) actions, i.e. contradicting reality; Subjunctive I and the Suppositional Mood express problematic actions. All the forms of the mentioned above Moods can be presented in the following table: