Subjunctive; Shuowen Jiezi
Chinese lacks a subjunctive or conditional mood/aspect/tense. So how do we express irreal conditions in Chinese?
For modals 想 xiang helps a lot. 想要 ， 必须 are good modals. so is yinggai should 应该
Expressing the desired condition, followed by “then good state change” is the best I’ve got beyond using 想 and the above mentined modals, e.g. 例如：
有中文词汇列表就好了
“have chinese vocabulary list, then good changed” is literally what it says. i.e. i would like a list of chinese vocabulary.
Learning to read the Shuowen Jiezi
The head term is usually followed by a definition, then an etymology of the parts of the character.
也 in the showen jieze means literally also i.e. “synonym”
从 in the showen jiezei means “from”, “following”
the 从 portion is usually followed by the semantic, [从＋semantic element] then the phonetic components in pictophonetic characters [phonetic element+聲].
从 [character] 聲。 Indicates the phonetic element is [character]
Example: Definition of 列
分解也。
divide split also
[i.e. means: split, divide]
Example: Definition of 神
天神引出萬物者也。
Also means: Heaven divine draws out thousands of things.
天神引三字同在古音 Heaven divine extends the third character in accord with the sound. [i.e. 申 is the phonetic element of 天神]
第十二部。12th heading
从示。Semantic element is 示.
申聲。Sounds like shen申.
食鄰切。Good food near cutting.