Which sentence uses the past tense verb be in the subjunctive mood?

• You are interested in reading.
• He is an interesting author.
• We were excited about his first book.
• I wish he were more prolific

I wish he were more prolific.

The sentence "I wish he were more prolific" uses the past tense verb be in the subjunctive mood.

The sentence that uses the past tense verb "be" in the subjunctive mood is:

"I wish he were more prolific."

To identify the subjunctive mood in this sentence, we can look at the verb "were." In the subjunctive mood, the verb "be" is conjugated as "were" regardless of the subject. In this case, "he" is the subject, but instead of saying "he was," the subjunctive form is used: "he were."

To get to the answer, you need to understand the concept of the subjunctive mood and how it is used. The subjunctive mood is used to express hypothetical or contrary-to-fact situations. In this case, the speaker is expressing a wish or desire for the person to be more prolific, which is contrary to the current reality.

So, by understanding the nature of the subjunctive mood and paying attention to the conjugation of the verb "be," we can identify that the sentence "I wish he were more prolific" uses the past tense verb "be" in the subjunctive mood.