The Indicative Mood

2. The Indicative Mood

The indicative mood is the basic mood of the verb. Morphologically it is the most developed system including all the categories of the verb.

Semantically it is a fact mood. It serves to present an action as a fact of reality. It is the «most objective» or the «least subjective» of all the moods. It conveys minimum personal attitude to the fact. This becomes particularly manifest in such sentences as Water consists of oxygen and hydrogen where consists denotes an actual fact, and the speaker's attitude is neutral.

We shall now proceed to the analysis of the grammatical categories of the indicative mood system.

The category of tense is a system of three-member opposemes such as writes – wrote – will write, is writing – was writing – will be writing showing the relation of the time of the action denoted by the verb to the moment of speech.

The time of an action or event can be expressed lexically with the help of such words and combinations of words as yesterday, next week, now, a year ago, at half past seven, on the fifth of March, in 1957, etc. It can also be shown grammatically by means of the category of tense.

The difference between the lexical and the grammatical expression of time is somewhat similar to the difference between the lexical and the grammatical expression of number.

a) Lexically it is possible to name any definite moment or period of time: a century, a year, a day, a minute. The grammatical meaning of 'tense' is an abstraction from» only three particular tenses: the 'present', the 'past' and the I future*.

b) Lexically a period of time is named directly (e. g. on Sunday). The grammatical indication of time is indirect: it is not time that a verb like asked names, but an action that took place before the moment of speech.

c) As usual, the grammatical meaning of 'tense' is relative. Writes denotes a 'present' action because it is contrasted with wrote denoting a 'past' action and with will write naming a 'future' action. Writing does not indicate the time of the action because it has not tense opposites. Can has only a 'past tense' opposite, so it cannot refer to the past, but it may refer to the present and future (can do it yesterday is impossible, but can do it today, tomorrow is normal).

N o t e. By analogy with can, must has acquired the oblique meaning of 'present-future' tense, but sometimes it refers to the past.

It is usual to express the notions of time graphically by means of notions of space. Let us then imagine the limitless stretch of time – a very long railway along which we are moving in a train.

Let us further suppose that the train is now at station C. This is, so to say, the present. Stations A, B and all other stations passed by the train are the past, and stations D, E and all other stations the train is going to reach are in the future.

It would seem that the present is very insignificant, a mere point in comparison with the limitless past and future. But this point is of tremendous importance to the people in the train, because they are always in the present. When the train reaches station D, it ceases to be the future and becomes the present, while station C joins the past.

In reality, and accordingly in speech, the relation between the present, the past and the future is much more complicated. The present is reflected in speech not only as a mere point, the moment of speaking or thinking, but as a more or less long period of time including this moment. Compare, for instance, the meanings of the word now in the following sentences:

1. A minute ago he was crying, and n o w he is laughing.

2. A century ago people did not even dream of the radio, and now we cannot imagine our life without it.

The period of time covered by the second now is much longer, without, definite limits, but it includes the moment of speaking.

In the sentence The Earth rotates round the Sun we also deal with the present. But the present in this case not only includes the present moment, but it covers an immense period of time stretching: in both directions from the present moment.

Thus the 'present' is a variable period of time including the present moment or the moment of speech.

The 'past' is the time preceding the present moment, and the 'future' is the time following the present moment. Neither of them includes the present moment.

The correlation of time and tense is connected with the problem of the absolute and relative use of tense grammemes.

We say that some tense is absolute if it shows the time of the action in relation to the present moment (the moment of speech).

This is the case in the Russian sentences:

Он работает на заводе.

Он работал на заводе.

Он будет работать на заводе.

The same in English:

He works at a factory.

He worked at a factory.

He will work at a factory.

But very often tense reflects the time of an action not with regard to the moment of speech but to some other moment in the past or in the future, indicated by the tense of another verb.

E.g.

он работает на заводе

Он сказал, что он работал на заводе

он будет работать на заводе

он работает на заводе

Он скажет, что он работал на заводе

он будет работать на заводе

Here the tenses of the principal clauses сказал and скажет are used absolutely, while all the tenses of the subordinate clauses are used relatively. The present tense does not refer to the present time but to the time of the action сказал in the first case and скажет in the second. The future tense он будет работать does not indicate the time following the present moment, but the time following the moment of the action сказал in the first case and скажет in the second. The same holds true with regard to the past tense.

In English such relative use of tenses is also possible with regard to some future moment.

he works at a factory

He will say that he worked at a factory.

he will work at a factory.

But as a rule, this is impossible with regard to a moment in the past, as in

he works at a factory.

He said that he worked at a factory.

he will work at a factory.

Instead of that an Englishman uses:

he worked at a factory.

He said that he had worked at a factory.

he would work at a factory.

Why is the first version impossible, or at least uncommon? Because the tenses of works, worked, will work cannot be used relatively with regard to the past moment indicated by the verb said (as it would be in Russian, for instance). In English they are, as a rule, used absolutely, i.e. with regard to the moment of speech.

Therefore a 'present tense' verb may be used here only if the time of the action it expresses includes the moment of speech, which occurs, for instance, in clauses expressing general statements (He said that water boils at 100^o C), in clauses of comparison (Last year he spoke much worse than he does now), and in some other cases.

Similarly, a 'future tense' verb may be used here if the action it expresses refers to some time following the moment of speech.

E. g. Yesterday I heard some remarks about the plan we shall discuss tomorrow.

The past tense of worked in the sentence He said that he worked at a factory also shows the past time not with regard to the time of the action of saying (as would be the case in the Russian sentence он сказал, что работает на заводе), but with regard to the moment of speech.

Since English has special forms of the verb to express 'precedence' or 'priority' – the perfect forms – the past perfect is used to indicate that an action preceded some other action (or event) in the past. He said that he ha d worked at a factory. But both in the principal and in the subordinate clause the tense of the verb is the same – the past tense used absolutely.

Summing up, we» may say that a 'past tense' verb is used in an English subordinate clause not because there is a 'past tense' verb in the principal clause, i.e. as a result of the so-called sequence of tenses, but simply in accordance with its meaning of 'past tense'.

The category of posteriority is the system of two-member opposemes, like shall come – should come, will be writing – would be writing, showing whether an action is posterior with regard to the moment of speech or to some moment in the past.

As we know, a 'past tense' verb denotes an action prior to the moment of speech and a 'future tense' verb names a posterior action with regard to the moment of speech. When priority or posteriority is expressed in relation to the moment of speech, we call it absolute. But there may be relative priority or posteriority, with regard to some other moment. A form like had written, for instance, expresses an action prior to some moment in the past, i.e. it expresses relative priority. The form should enter expresses posteriority with regard to so Tie past moment, i.e. relative posteriority.

The first, member of the opposeme shall enter – should enter has, the meaning of 'absolute posteriority', and the second member possesses the meaning of 'relative posteriority'.

These two meanings are the particular manifestations of the general meaning of the – category, that of 'posteriority'.

The grammemes represented by should come, would come are traditionally called the future in the past, a name which reflects their meaning of 'relative posteriority'. But there is no agreement as to the place these grammemes occupy in the system of the English verb.

Some linguists 1 regard them as isolated grammemes, outside the system of morphological categories. Others 3 treat them as some kind of 'dependent future tense' and classify them with those 'finite verb forms' which depend on the nature of the sentence. A.I. Smirnitsky tries to prove that they are not 'tense forms' but 'mood forms', since they are homonymous with the so-called 'conditional mood forms'.

Cf. I thought it would rain. I think it would rain if it were not so windy.

In our opinion none of these theories are convincing.

1. The grammemes discussed are not isolated. As shown above they belong to the morphological category of posteriority.

2. They are not «tense forms». In the sentences

I know she will come.

I knew she would come.

I had Mown she would come.

neither will come – would come, nor knew – had known is a tense opposeme, because the difference between the members of the opposemes is not that of tense. The members of the first opposeme share the meaning of 'future' tense, those of the second opposeme – the meaning of 'past tense'. The only meanings the members of the first opposeme distinguish are those of 'absolute' and 'relative' posteriority. The members of the second opposeme distinguish only the meanings of 'perfect.' – 'non-perfect' order.

3. The grammemes in question are not 'mood forms'. As we know all the grammemes of the subjunctive mood (with the exception of be) are homonymous with those of the indicative mood. So the fact that would rain is used in both moods proves nothing.

The examples produced by A.I. Smirnitsky clearly show the difference between would rain in the sentence I thought it would rain and in the sentence I think it would rain, if it were not so windy. The first would rain is opposed to will rain (I think it will rain) and denotes a real action following some other action in the past (I thought…). In other words, it possesses the meanings of 'indicative' mood and 'relative' posteriority. The second would rain cannot be opposed to will rain. It denotes an imaginary action simultaneous with or following the moment of speech (I think…). Hence, it has the meanings of 'non-perfect' order and 'subjunctive mood'.

The category of person in the Indo-European languages serves to present an action as associated by the speaking person with himself (or a group of persons including the speaker), the person or persons addressed, and the person or thing (persons or things) not participating in the process of speech. (Cf. with the meanings of the personal pronouns.) Thus in Russian it is represented in sets of three-member opposemes such as

читаю – читаешь – читает

читаем – читаете – читают

Likewise in Modern German we have

gehe – gehst – geht

gehen – geht – gehen

In Modern English the category of person has certain peculiarities.