Thursday, July 12, 2007

Order of Adverbs
There is a basic order in which adverbs will appear when there is more than one. It is similar to The Royal Order of Adjectives, but it is even more flexible.
THE ROYAL ORDER OF ADVERBS

Verb Manner Place Frequency Time Purpose
Beth swims enthusiastically in the pool every morning before dawn to keep in shape.
Dad walks impatiently into town every afternoon before supper to get a newspaper.
Tashonda naps in her room every morning before lunch.
In actual practice, of course, it would be highly unusual to have a string of adverbial modifiers beyond two or three (at the most). Because the placement of adverbs is so flexible, one or two of the modifiers would probably move to the beginning of the sentence: "Every afternoon before supper, Dad impatiently walks into town to get a newspaper." When that happens, the introductory adverbial modifiers are usually set off with a comma.

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