IMPERATIVE

Formation:

We use the infinitive to form the Imperative.

Affirmative sentences Negative sentences

Come here. Don't come now.
Clean the bathroom. Don't clean the living room.
Help your father. Don't play on the computer

Use the exclamation only when you want to make an exclamation, e.g. Stop! Help!

The Imperative with let's

Affirmative sentences Negative sentences

Let's ask the teacher. Let's not ask the teacher.

Uses

We use imperative clauses when we want to tell someone to do something (most commonly
for advice, suggestions, requests, commands, orders or instructions).We can use them to tell
people to do or not to do things.

They usually don’t have a subject – they are addressed to the listener or listeners, who the
speaker understands to be the subject. We use the base form of the verb:

Have fun. Enjoy your meal. Stop talking and open your books. Don’t be late.

1.Giving commands

We often use an imperative in commands, and we also use must. They both sound very direct:
Stop talking now!There are a number of ways of making commands sound more polite. We
can add please at the end of what we say, or we can use a question form to make a command
sound more like a request, or we can use I’d like you to + infinitive or I’d be grateful if you’d
+ infinitive without to:

Ask Max to sign this form and then send it off immediately please, Gwyn.Will you bring us the
files on the Hanley case please, Maria?I’d like you to bring us four coffees at eleven when we
take a break in the meeting.I’d be grateful if you didn’t tell anyone about this.

Public notices:Public notices often give direct commands using no, do not or must:

2.Giving instructions

We use instructions to tell someone how to do something. We usually use imperatives. They
do not sound too direct in this context:
Beat four eggs, like this. Then add the flour gradually. Don’t beat the eggs too much
though.Thread your needle with a piece of thread about 25 cm long. Mark the spot where you
want the button. Insert the needle from the back of the fabric and bring it through …

In speaking, we often use the present simple when we are giving instructions and
demonstrations, and we say like so meaning ‘like this’:You fold the A4 piece of paper like so.
Then you glue some shapes onto this side and sprinkle some glitter on it like so.

3.-Imperatives with subject pronouns

For emphasis, we can use you in an imperative clause:

A:Can I leave the room?

B:No. You stay here.

In negative imperatives of this type, you comes after don’t:

Maria, don’t you try to pay for this. I invited you for lunch and I insist on paying.

Be careful when using subject pronouns in imperative clauses, as they can sound very direct.

We can also use words like someone, somebody, no one, nobody, everyone, everybody,
especially in speaking:

Somebody call a doctor. Quick!Everybody sit down, please.

4.Imperatives with do
When we use the emphatic do auxiliary, it makes an imperative sound more polite and more
formal:

Do start. (formal) Do sit down and make yourself comfortable.

We can use emphatic do in short answers without a main verb:

A:Can I use your phone to call a taxi?

B:Do, of course, by all means. It’s there on the desk.

5.Imperatives with let (let’s)

We use let to form first person and third person imperatives.

First person

Let me see. What should I do?

Let’s start at nine-thirty tomorrow, please. OkayLet us begin by welcoming our new
members.

We can use emphatic do with let’s in formal contexts:

Do let’s try to be more environmentally friendly.

Very often we use let’s (let us) when we are referring to the first person singular (me):

I can’t find my keys. Let’s see, where did I last have them? (or Let me see, …)

We can use let’s on its own in short responses, meaning ‘yes’, when we respond to a
suggestion:

A:Shall we stop now and have a coffee break?

B:Let’s.

Third person

Third person imperatives are not common; they are formed with let + him/her/it or a noun
phrase:

How will Patrick know which house is ours?

B:Let him knock on all the doors until he finds ours!

Negative imperatives

To make negative imperatives, we use the auxiliary do + not + the infinitive without to. The
full form do not, is rather formal. In speaking, we usually use don’t:

Do not use the lift in the event of fire.(public notes)

Don’t tell anyone that I was here.

We can use don’t on its own in short responses:

A:Shall I show everyone the old photo of you?

B:No, don’t. It’s terrible!

Negative imperatives with subject pronoun

We can use emphatic pronoun you or anyone/anybody after don’t in negative imperatives,
especially in informal speaking:

Don’t you worry. Everything will be okay.It’s a surprise party so don’t anybody mention it to
Jim.
Negative imperative of let’s
We often use the phrase let’s not:Let’s not forget to lock the door!

We sometimes use don’t let’s in more formal contextDon’t let’s mention anything about her
husband. I think they’ve split up.

Question tags commonly used after imperatives

We sometimes use question tags with imperatives. They make the imperative less direct:

Turn on the light, will you?

Ask him, can you?

Won’t you? adds more emphasis to the imperative:

Write to me, won’t you?

The tag after a negative imperative is normally will you:

Don’t tell anyone, will you?

Imperatives as offers and invitations

We can use imperatives to make offers and invitations:Have another piece of melon.

Please stay another night. You know you’ll be most welcome.

Go on! Come to the match with us tonight.

Don’t be afraid to ask if you want anything.

IMPERATIVE SENTENCES

Definition

In English grammar, an imperative sentence is a type of sentence that gives advice or

instructions or that expresses a request or command. (Compare with sentences that make a
statement, ask a question, or express an exclamation.) Also known as a directive or jussive.
An imperative sentence typically begins with the base form of a verb, as in Go now! The
implied subject you is said to be "understood" (or elliptical): (You) go now!

An imperative sentence ends with a period or an exclamation point.

For information about negating or softening an imperative sentence, see Examples and
Observations below. Also see:

Etymology
From the Latin, "command"

Examples and Observations

 "Think Small"
(slogan of Volkswagen)
 "Put an egg in your shoe, and beat it. Make like a tree, and leave. Tell your story
walking."
(Jonathan Lethem, Motherless Brooklyn. Doubleday, 1999)
 "We're going into the attic now, folks. Keep your accessories with you at all times."
(Buzz Lightyear, Toy Story 3, 2010)
 "Go ahead, make my day."
(Clint Eastwood as Harry Callahan in Sudden Impact, 1983)

 "Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest."
(Mark Twain)
 Westley: Give us the gate key.
Yellin: I have no gate key.
Inigo Montoya: Fezzik, tear his arms off.
Yellin: Oh, you mean this gate key.
(The Princess Bride, 1987)
 "Take me out to the ball game,
Take me out with the crowd.Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack,
I don't care if I never get back."
(Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer, "Take Me Out to the Ball Game")

 "Seek simplicity, and distrust it."

(Alfred North Whitehead)
 "And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you; ask what
you can do for your country."
(President John Kennedy, Inaugural Address, 1961)
 "Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia!"
(El Jefe, Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia, 1974)
 "Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened."
(Theodor Geisel)
 "Take this quarter, go downtown, and have a rat gnaw that thing off your face!"
(John Candy as Buck Russell in Uncle Buck, 1989)
 "Take, if you must, this little bag of dreams;Unloose the cord, and they will wrap you
round."
(William Butler Yeats, "Fergus and the Druid," 1892)
 "Carpe diem. Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary."
(Robin Williams as John Keating in Dead Poets Society, 1989)
 "Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your
mouth shut."
(Ernest Hemingway)
 "You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that
unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go
back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the
slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and
will be changed."
(Martin Luther King, Jr., "I Have a Dream," August 1963)

 "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!"

(Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy)
 "Forget them, Wendy. Forget them all. Come with me where you'll never, never have
to worry about grown up things again."
(Peter in film adaptation of Peter Pan, 2003)
 "Wash the white clothes on Monday and put them on the stone heap; wash the color
clothes on Tuesday and put them on the clothesline to dry; don't walk barehead in the
hot sun; cook pumpkin fritters in very hot sweet oil; soak your little cloths right after
you take them off; when buying cotton to make yourself a nice blouse, be sure that it
doesn't have gum on it, because that way it won't hold up well after a wash; soak salt
fish overnight before you cook it . . .."
(Jamaica Kincaid, "Girl." At the Bottom of the River. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1983)
 "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and
philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He
may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now
in hard words, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again,
though it contradict every thing you said today."
(Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Self-Reliance," 1841)

 Negating an Imperative Sentence

"To negate a declarative sentence, as shown in (4), do is absent and not is contracted
with the verb. In the corresponding imperative, the auxiliary do is combined with not
and placed at the beginning of the sentence before the verb.

(4) Declarative Sentence: You aren't lazy.

(4) Imperative Sentence: Don't be lazy.

(Ron Cowan, The Teacher's Grammar of English: A Course Book and Reference
Guide. Cambridge University Press, 2008)

- "Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed. The ability to
destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force."
(Darth Vader, Star Wars, 1977)

- "Do not on any account attempt to write on both sides of the paper at once."
(W. C. Sellar and R. J. Yeatman, 1066 and All That. Methuen, 1930)
 The Understood "You" in an Imperative Sentence
"Some imperatives appear to have a third person subject as in the following:

Somebody, strike a light! (AUS#47:24)

Even in a sentence like this one, though, there is an understood second person subject;
in other words, the implied subject is somebody among you all out there. Again, this
becomes clearer when we tack on a question tag--suddenly the second person subject
pronoun surfaces:

Somebody, strike a light, will you? (AUS#47:24)

In an example like this, it is quite clear that we are not dealing with a declarative, since
the verb form would then be different: somebody strikes a light."
(Kersti Börjars and Kate Burridge, Introducing English Grammar, 2nd ed. Hodder,
2010)

 Softening the Imperative

"The bare imperative is a very direct form in English and should be used with great
care in order to avoid the perception of impoliteness. It is not generally used to make
requests/commands or give instructions (e.g. in service encounters in shops or
restaurants) except in cases where people are very familiar with one another, and
except where accompanied by please. . . .

"Just and/or please can also soften an imperative:

[customer and market trader]

A: And some peppers, please.
B: Yeah. How many?
A: Just give me two big ones, please.

"Imperatives with emphatic do-auxiliary are perceived as more polite than bare
imperatives:

[to guests who have just arrived]

Do take your coats off."

(Ronald Carter and Michael McCarthy, Cambridge Grammar of English. Cambridge

University Press, 2006)

 Imperative Sentences in an Introductory Paragraph

"Imagine a morning in late November. A coming of winter morning more than twenty
years ago. Consider the kitchen of a spreading old house in a country town. A great
black stove is its main feature; but there is also a big round table and a fireplace with
two rocking chairs placed in front of it. Just today the fireplace commenced its
seasonal roar."
(Truman Capote, "A Christmas Memory." Mademoiselle, December 1956)