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Difficultés anglaises

> adverb A word that adds to our information about a VERB, as in "work rapidly"; about an ADJECTIVE, as in "an extremely beautiful young woman"; or about another adverb, as in "sleeping very soundly". Adverbs are said to modify the words to which they apply since they limit the words in some way and make them more specific. Thus, adding "slowly" to "walk", as in "They walked slowly down the hill", limits the verb "walk" since all other forms of "walk", such as "quickly", "lazily", etc, have been discarded.• There are several different kinds of adverbs, categorized according to the information they provide about the word they modify. They include adverbs of time, adverbs of place, adverbs of manner, adverbs of degree, adverbs of frequency, adverbs of probability, adverbs of duration and interrogative adverbs.• An adverb of time tells us when something happened, and they include such words as "now", "then", "later", "soon", "afterwards", "yesterday", etc, as in "He is due to arrive now", I will call you later", "She had a rest and went out afterwards", "They left yesterday".• An adverb of place tells us where something happened. Adverbs of place include such words as "there", "here", "somewhere", "anywhere", "thereabouts", "abroad", "outdoors", "overhead", "underground", "hither and thither", etc, as in "I haven't been there", "They" couldn't see her anywhere", "His family live abroad", and "We heard a noise overhead".• An adverb of manner tells us how something happens, and they include a wide range of possibilities. Frequently adverbs in this category are formed by adding -ly to an adjective. Examples of these include: anxious, anxiously • bad, badly • cautious, cautiously • dumb, dumbly • elegant, elegantly • fashionable, fashionably • fearless, fearlessly • hot, hotly • interested, interestedly • joking, jokingly • lame, lamely • mean, meanly • narrow, narrowly • pale, palely • quick, quickly • soothing, soothingly • sound, soundly • tough, toughly • unwilling, unwillingly • vain, vainly • weak, weakly Some adjectives have to be modified in some way before the suffix -ly is added to form the adverbs. For example, in adjectives ending in -y, the y changes to i before -ly is added. Examples of these include: angry, angrily • busy, busily • canny, cannily • dry, drily • easy, easily • funny, funnily • happy, happily • merry, merrily • pretty, prettily • silly, sillily • tatty, tattily • weary, wearily Note the exceptions "shyly", "slyly", "wryly".• Adjectives ending in -e frequently drop the e before adding -ly. Examples of these include: able, ably • feeble, feebly • gentle, gently • peaceable, peaceably • true, truly • unintelligible, unintelligibly Suffixes other than -ly that may be added to adjectives to form adverbs of manner include -wards, as in backwards, heavenwards; -ways, as in edgeways, sideways; -wise, as in clockwise, moneywise.• Some adverbs of manner may take the same form as the adjectives to which they correspond. These include "fast", "hard", "solo", "straight", "wrong", as in "She took the wrong book" and "Don't get me wrong".• An adverb of degree tells us the degree, extent or intensity of something that happens, and they include "hugely", "immensely", "moderately", "adequately", "greatly", "strongly", "tremendously", "profoundly", "totally", "entirely", "perfectly", "partially", "practically", "virtually", "almost", as in "They" enjoyed the show hugely", "The office was not adequately equipped", "We strongly disapprove of such behaviour", "He was totally unaware of the facts", "They are virtually penniless".• An adverb of frequency is used to tell us how often something happens, and they include "never", "rarely", "seldom", "infrequently", "occasionally", "periodically", "intermittently", "sometimes", "often", "frequently", "regularly", "normally", "always", "constantly", "continually", as in "She never eats breakfast", "We go to the cinema occasionally", "He goes to the dentist regularly", "Normally they travel by bus", "He is in pain constantly".• An adverb of probability tells us how often something happens, and they include "probably", "possibly", "conceivably", "perhaps", "maybe", "presumably", "hopefully", "definitely", "certainly", "indubitably", "doubtless", as in "You will probably see them there", "He may conceivably pass the exam this time", "Presumably they know that she is leaving", "Hopefully the news will be good", "I am definitely not going", "He is indubitably a criminal".• An adverb of duration tells us how long something takes or lasts, and they include "briefly", "temporarily", "long", "indefinitely", "always", "permanently", "forever", as in "We stopped briefly for coffee", "Have you known her long?", "Her face is permanently disfigured", "They have parted forever".• An adverb of emphasis adds emphasis to the action described by the verb, and they include "absolutely", "certainly", "positively", "quite", "really", "simply", "just", as in "They absolutely detest each other", "He positively adores her", "She really wants to be forgiven", "I simply must go now"• An interrogative adverb asks questions, and they include "where", "when", "how", and "why", as in "Where are you going?", "When will you be back?", "How will you get there?", "Why have they asked you to go?" They are placed at the beginning of sentences, and such sentences always end with a question mark. Pour éviter fautes de grammaire, contresens et confusions. The English Usage Dictionary est le parfait complément des dictionnaires bilingues, du dictionnaire de définitions anglaises et du Thesaurus. Ce dictionnaire signale toutes les difficultés que recèle l'usage d'un mot: orthographe, grammaire, prononciation, homonymies, etc. Exemple d'article du dictionnaire English Usage Dictionary