The Subjunctive, Once Again.

Question

In these two sentences.....

"No, you did the opposite of what I told you, I told you to tell Sarah to write the letter and to tell Mark to attend the meeting."

"No, lo hiciste al revés de como te dije. Te dije que le dijeras a Sarah que escribiera la carta y que le dijeras a Mark que asistiera a la cita."

(I'm sure that the Spanish sentence is correct because it was corrected by a Spanish professor)

In the above sentence, there's no doubt that I told the guy to tell Sarah and Mark what I told him to tell them, so why is the imperfect subjunctive??

Also, in case I know that Sarah and Mark did what they were told to do, do I still need the subjunctive??

Thanks.

Answer 1

Also, in case I know that Sarah and Mark did what they were told to do, do I still need the subjunctive??

Good question. If you use reported speech, obviously you don't, but subjunctive is subordinated to the main sentence, so it does have to obey the rules even though they don't make sense from our current perspective.

Why wouldn't you say in English "I told you to ask Sarah to... she writes the letter"? What's wrong? She did write the letter after all, didn't she? Yes, but your sentence is still recalling past events, so you have to keep the structure you initiated and say "... to write the letter". Subjunctive is no different from this. You are not fighting a whimsical grammar, but hundreds of millions of native speakers who expect things to work in a way that makes sense to them in order to understand one another. You just need to learn those rules.

Can I avoid the subjunctive by saying "I told you that Mark had to do.... Te dije que Mark tuvo que asistir a la cita" ? - SpanishPal, Aug 11, 2011

Yes. - lazarus1907, Aug 12, 2011

Answer 2

I don't know the exact rule, but the way I look at it is that it is an indirect command, which requires the subjunctive.

Do it! = ¡Hazlo!

What? (I said) to do it! = ¿Qué? ¡Que lo hagas!

I told you to do it! = ¡Te dije que lo hicieras!

Here is a link.

Could you either expkain this or provide a link. Thanks. - jeezzle, Aug 11, 2011

I understand all the ways explained in your edit, not by book learning but by hearing it that way, but you talk about some indirect rule which I don't understand. - jeezzle, Aug 11, 2011

I added a link. - gintar77, Aug 11, 2011

Gracias. I will check it out. - jeezzle, Aug 11, 2011

Answer 3

Because the Subjunctive is used in requests... W.E.I.R.D.O... and you "told" somebody in the past. When the subjunctive is needed in the past, we use the imperfect subjunctive.

Past: Te dije que le dijeras a Sarah que escribiera la carta y que le dijeras a Mark que asistiera a la cita."

I told you to tell Sarah to write the letter, and to tell Mark to attend the meeting.

Or present...

Te digo que le digas a Sarah que escriba la carta y que le digas a Mark que asista a la cita.

I'm telling you to tell Sarah to write the letter and to tell Mark to attend the meeting.

They actually did it? If you would like to state it as a fact, you would not need the subjunctive. We needed the subjunctive before because you were asking someone to do something.

I told you that Sarah wrote the letter and that Mark attended the meeting.

Te dije que Sarah escribió la carta, y que Mark asistió a la cita.

I hope this helps, and that my Spanish is ok

I don't agree 100% with your explanation, but your logic and your examples can't be easily refuted, so well done! - lazarus1907, Aug 11, 2011

Gracias, maestro :) - GuitarWarrior, Aug 11, 2011

Answer 4

The subjunctive has been sufficiently explained, however this below sounds a little awkward:

"No, lo hiciste al revés de como te dije.

You might try "No, lo hiciste al contrario de lo que te había dicho."