§5.2 The preterite 47Because of the contrasting meanings of glad and wish, we understand from [ia]
that they do in fact live nearby, and from [ib] that they don't. In [ib] they lived
nearby is thus interpreted counterfactually, i.e. as contrary to fact, or false: this
is the highest degree of modal remoteness.
A lesser degree of modal remoteness is seen in [iib]: this doesn't imply that she
definitely won't arrive tomorrow, but it suggests that it may well be that she
won't (perhaps I'm proposing a change to current arrangements where she's
arriving at some other time). In these two examples the modal preterite is gram
matically obligatory, for wish requires a preterite form of the verb in a finite com
plement, and so does the idiom would rather.
In [iii-iv], we find something different again: here there is a choice between pres
ent tense and preterite. These examples illustrate an important distinction between
two kinds of conditional construction, open, as in [iiiaJiva], vs remote, as in
[iiib/ivb ].
The open type characteristically leaves it open as to whether the condition is or
will be fulfilled: he may love her or he may not; you may leave now or you may'
not.
The remote type, by contrast, generally presents the fulfilment of the condi
tion as a more remote possibility. So [iiib] suggests a readiness to believe that
he doesn't love her; this is the version I'd use, for example, in a context where
he's not planning to change his job and I'm arguing from this that he doesn't
love her. Similarly, [ivb] presents your leaving now as somewhat less likely
than in the case of [iva]: it would generally be preferred, for example, in a con
text where your current plans or inclinations are to leave later.(c) Backshift
A third use of the preterite shows up in indirect reported speech. Notice the contrast
between has and had in this pair:
[37] i Kim has blue eyes.
ii I told Stacy that Kim had blue eyes.[original utterance: present tense]
[indirect report: preterite]If I say [i] to Stacy, I can use [ii] as an indirect report to tell you what I said to Stacy.
I'm repeating the content of what I said to Stacy, but not the exact wording. My
utterance to Stacy contained the present tense form has, but my report of it contains
preterite had. Nonetheless, my report is entirely accurate. This kind of change in
tense is referred to as backshift.
The most obvious cases of backshift are with verbs of reporting that are in the
preterite, like told or said. It would not occur with present tense verbs of saying; in
the present tense, my report would have been I tell Stacy that Kim has blue eyes. In
fact, even with preterite reporting verbs backshift is often optional: you can keep the
original present tense instead of backshifting it. Instead of [37ii], therefore, we can
have:
[38] I told Stacy that Kim has blue eyes.