Word-formation

1. An adverb is a word that modifies a verb as in She dances beautifully, an adjective (She looked somewhat pale), an adverb (She knew him very well) or a noun (He is such a monster!).

2. Most adverbs modify a verb and tell us how (adverbs of manner), when (adverbs of time), where (adverbs of place) or how often (adverbs of frequency) a certain action takes place: A turtle crawls slowly. We will eat later. Go there. He often visits us.

Adverbs of degree make the meaning of a verb, an adjective, adverb or noun stronger or weaker: I like the book very much; I completely forgot about it; she is incredibly beautiful; he is smoking very heavily; he is such a bore!

Sentence adverbs refer to the whole phrase to show what the speaker thinks about the whole utterance (Unfortunately, nobody saw him do it).

3. Many adverbs, especially adverbs of manner, are formed from adjectives by adding – ly: theoretically, completely, nicely and scarcely.

Adjectives that end in –ly (costly, friendly, likely, lively, lovely, lonely, silly, ugly) do not have related adverbial forms and to express manner they use such adjectival word combinations as in a friendly way, in a lively manner.

Many adverbs are simple or compound and do not end in –ly: now, very, yet; nowhere, inside, tenfold. Some of them coincide with adjectives in form as fast, often, long, straight, far, near.

Some adverbs have two forms – with and without -ly: late and lately, near and nearly, hard and hardly, high and highly, deep and deeply. Usually they differ in meaning (cf.: He came late ‘поздно’ and I haven’t seen him lately ‘последнее время’; He lives quite near ‘близко’ and It’s nearly ‘почти’ 6 o’clock; He works hard ‘усердно’ and He hardly ‘вряд-ли’ ever works properly; The plane flew very high ‘высоко’ and They have a highly ‘весьма, в высшей степени’ developed industry).

But there are also some adverbs that have two forms – one with –ly ending and one without the –ly ending and no difference in meaning. Adjectives that are commonly used in this way include: cheap, quick, slow, kind, real. Usually, however, the longer form with –ly is preferred, especially for writing: Don’t talk so loud/loudly. She buys her clothes cheap/cheaply. The shortened form is more likely to be used in speaking informally. Some more examples of these adverbs are:

direct – directly slow – slowly

tight – tightly clear – clearly

E x e r c i s e s

1.1. Say if the words below are adverbs of manner, frequency, time or place. Write each word under a heading to show if the word tells how, how often, when, or where.

How

how often

when

where

Quickly, slowly, today, usually, hopelessly, brightly, there, often, yesterday, happily, later, softly, forward, forever, eastward, always, nowadays, nowhere, twice, abroad, well, below, far, finally.

1.2. Put the correct form of the adverb.

1. The thief got (clean/cleanly) away and was never seen again.

2. He pulled the cork out of the bottle (clean/cleanly).

3. Stay (clear/clearly) of that man. He'll do you no good.

4. If you look at the situation (clear/clearly) you'll see that I'm right.

5. Take it (easy/easily)! You push yourself too much.

6. He beat me (easy/easily). He was much too good.

7. He (free/freely) admits that he has done the job.

8. Many teenagers try to break (free/freely) from their parents.

9. She left the door (wide/widely) open.

10. His items are (wide/widely) known.

11. He was (wrong/wrongly) accused.

12. Did I do something (wrong/wrongly)?

13. It was raining (hard/hardly).

14. It (hard/hardly) matters now.

1.3. Translate into Russian and back into English.

I watched him closely. We were sitting close. Philip came late to dinner. They had not seen her lately. The woman held her head high. It is highly suspicious. He put his hands deep into his pockets.

It’s so deeply true. His mouth was opened wide. She must indeed be widely changed from what she once was. She hardly dared to breath. He was breathing hard. We’ve been here nearly a week. What need have you for coming so near?