Track 69

1. English has a mood tense too Concept

One tense left, and it is the teacher's favourite thing about Spanish. Grammatically it is the subjunctive; here it is the mood tense, because all it does is show mood.

English has it, just used far less. Compare these two:

it is important that you are here

everyday, casual

it is important that you be here

more serious, more imperative

The feeling changes because of you be instead of you are. English builds it other ways too: had I gone, I would know, or not only is it a problem. Both invert the word order the way a question does, without being questions.

There is little correlation between how the two languages use it, so do not try to map them onto each other. The point is only that the idea is not completely alien to you.

2. Switch the endings between groups Rule

Forming it needs no new sounds at all. -ar verbs borrow the -er/-ir endings, and -er/-ir verbs borrow the -ar endings.

-ar verbs take -er/-ir endings, and the reverse

habla → hable
he speaks

hablan → hablen
they speak

hablamos → hablemos
we speak

como → coma
I eat

comen → coman
they eat

For the "we" form use -emos, not the odd i that turns up in vivimos and salimos.

3. I joins he, she, it and formal you Grammar

Hablo would only swap one o for another, so it does not change that way. Instead hable covers I as well, and the same for coma.

hable

I, he, she, it, you (formal)

coma

I, he, she, it, you (formal)

4. Obligatory after quiero que Rule

I want you to wait is a peculiar English structure that most languages do not copy. Spanish, like French, Portuguese and Italian, says I want that you wait, and that second verb goes into the mood tense.

Quiero que esperes. (I want you to wait)

This is an obligatory use. Saying "quiero que esperas" is an error and will distract from what you are saying.

Quiero que lo esperes · ¿Quieres que te espere? · ¿Quieres que yo te espere?

When you express what you want in this way, you are putting your subjectivity onto the world, and what follows que takes the mood tense.

5. Obligatory and optional uses Overview

The uses divide in two, and both matter for different reasons.

Obligatory: leave the mood tense out and it is simply wrong. These cases give you the important exposure to how the mood tense feels.
Optional: you use it to add a different meaning, flavour or feeling. This is the much more exciting area.

6. It doubles as practice of everything else Method

A side benefit worth noticing. To build the mood tense you first have to work out what the verb would normally be, and only then switch it.

So practising this is also a mental workout on all the tenses you have already learned. The extra step is a feature, not a cost.

Clarify with the subject word when the form is ambiguous: ¿Quieres que yo te espere? pins down that it is me waiting.