Saw a movie today and there was a guy who said
It's important he reads this.
Its beautiful and confusing to me at the same time. What's the grammar structure behind this sentence? Where I can read more about this so I can use it?
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2 Answers
This is the subjunctive mood, as @sbutkovi says. The more "correct" way to use the subjunctive mood would be to say "It's important [that] he read this" - where read is the bare infinitive, not conjugated for the third person singular, as it would be in the indicative mood.
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Not everyone obeys all the rules of "correct" English all the time, even if they are native speakers. What movie is this from, out of curiosity? Do you have a clip? Feb 11, 2019 at 22:01
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BTW - I know "Boy Erased" is an American movie, but apparently it is more common in British English to use the indicative in place of the subjunctive - which is what's happening here. See a related discussion here: ell.stackexchange.com/questions/196357/… Feb 15, 2019 at 1:09
"It's important he reads this" is an example of the subjunctive mood, which can be read about more here:
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/grammar/when-to-use-the-subjunctive https://grammar.collinsdictionary.com/us/easy-learning/the-subjunctive https://grammarist.com/grammar/subjunctive-mood/
In general, the subjunctive mood is used to discuss things in a hypothetical or uncertain sense.
