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Original poster

If I knew you were coming I’d have baked a cake

20 replies

DizzyPraline · 03/04/2023 21:16

What tense is this?

OP posts:
Jewelanemone · 03/04/2023 21:21

Pluperfect? Past conditional? It's been a while since I studied this 🫤

Original poster
DizzyPraline · 03/04/2023 21:27

Hmm pluperfect makes some kind of sense. Dh and I thought maybe subjunctive

OP posts:
SunnySkeg · 03/04/2023 21:30

Subjunctive. Pluperfect is far in the past.

SunnySkeg · 03/04/2023 21:31

Sorry, 'if I knew you were coming' is subjunctive, 'I'd have baked' is future perfect conditional.

mauvish · 03/04/2023 21:33

I think it should really be "If I had known you were coming" -- which is pluperfect.

"I would have baked a cake" -- I think this is past conditional, is it not?

we don't use the subjunctive much at all in English.

SqueakyDinosaur · 03/04/2023 21:35

It should actually be:

If I'd known you were coming I'd have baked a cake (person is already there, cake-baking beforehand no longer possible)

If I knew you were coming I'd bake a cake (not yet known whether person is coming, cake unbaked but still possible)

If I know you're coming I'll bake a cake (expression of future intention to bake a cake linked to person's arrival)

Too lazy to rummage around in old TEFL books but those are the "pairings" of conditional action & response.

mauvish · 03/04/2023 21:38

Conditional tenses are used to speculate about what could happen, what might have happened, and what we wish would happen. In English, most sentences using the conditional contain the word if. Many conditional forms in English are used in sentences that include verbs in one of the past tenses.

according to the wonderful world-wide web.

The English subjunctive is a special, relatively rare verb form that expresses something desired or imagined. We use the subjunctive mainly when talking about events that are not certain to happen. For example, we use the subjunctive when talking about events that somebody: wants to happen. anticipates will happen. --- Merriam Webster dictionary.

The Spanish routinely use the subjunctive in everyday speech; English doesn't. It often sounds archaic in English; "would that I were coming to the party! -- that's subjunctive. "Be that as it may" - that's subjunctive.

UsingChangeofName · 03/04/2023 21:39

I would have sung "If I'd known you were coming, I'd have baked a cake".

It just doesn't sound right as you have written it.

Confusion101 · 03/04/2023 22:04

Conditional tense..... The modh coinníollach! (Irish people, IYKYK)

Original poster
DizzyPraline · 03/04/2023 22:12

Yes I agree I’d say ‘if I’d known you were coming’ but I think ‘knew’ just sounds better in cookie monster’s gravelly voice.

OP posts:
ScentOfAMemory · 07/04/2023 13:34

It's a mixed conditional form as it's past simple in the "if" clause and would + present perfect in the second clause It's obviously poetic licence for lyrics though as the meaning isn't that of a mixed conditional.
As pp says, it's incorrect grammatically, as it should be a straightforward third conditional "if I'd known...I would have". Third conditionals refer to the unreal past/the past that never happened. I didn't know you were coming, so I didn't bake a cake.
Correct mixed conditionals (unreal past + present) exist...(if you hadn't lost the map (but you did) we wouldn't be lost now (but we are)

ScentOfAMemory · 07/04/2023 13:35

It isn't a tense btw. Technically English only has 2. Present Simple and Past Simple (tenses have changes made to the root to express time) All the others are aspects.

This sentence is just a bogstandard sentence with a conditional.

Fairislefandango · 07/04/2023 13:36

It's not correct to say 'I knew' in this sentence. It's the wrong sequence of tenses and doesn't make sense logically. The correct version is 'If I had known you were coming, I'd have baked a cake'and uses the pluperfect followed by the conditional perfect.

Fairislefandango · 07/04/2023 13:40

'Knew' isn't the subjunctive in your original answer, it's the simple past tense /preterite,which is standard with if clauses of that type, except when you're using the verb 'to be', where the subjunctive still surives as 'were'.

Sgtmajormummy · 07/04/2023 13:45

“If I’d known you were coming I’d have baked you a cake.”
Third conditional.

Konfetka · 07/04/2023 13:49

Would it have had buttercream icing?

FloatingRodger · 12/04/2023 16:54

Laughing my head off at this - the song comes into my head at random times and won't leave and I always mentally change it to 'If I'd had know you were coming I'd have baked a cake'.

Better than 'If I would of known you was coming I'd of brought a cake' I suppose.

FloatingRodger · 12/04/2023 16:55

^ "If I'd known you were coming" - Muphry's law...

DinahLord · 04/08/2023 10:19

If I knew = subjunctive
I’d have baked = conditional perfect

The first part of the sentence sets up the second. The first part is hypothetical and the second is what you would (conditional) have done (perfect).

upinaballoon · 04/08/2023 19:29

FloatingRodger · 12/04/2023 16:54

Laughing my head off at this - the song comes into my head at random times and won't leave and I always mentally change it to 'If I'd had know you were coming I'd have baked a cake'.

Better than 'If I would of known you was coming I'd of brought a cake' I suppose.

😀

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