28.17: Part 1: 16 THE ADVERBIAL MODIFIERS

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16 THE ADVERBIAL MODIFIERS

Adverbial modifiers include both single-word adverbs and adverbial phrases, and all of them may function as modifiers of adjectives, verbs, other adverbs, and as modifiers of the verb phrase as a whole or the sentence as a whole.

Form

16.1 Adverbs

Some adverbs are not formed from adjectives:

très	very
bien	well (also very)
mal	badly
vite	quickly, fast

But many adverbs are formed from adjectives. In general, the rule is to add -ment to the feminine form of the adjective. However, there are exceptions (which we have underlined).

Examples

Adjective (f.)	Adverb	Meaning
heureuse	heureusement	happily, fortunately
évidente	évidemment	obviously

Adjective (f.)	Adverb	Meaning
lente	lentement	slowly
rapide	rapidement	rapidly, fast
complète	complètement	completely
vraie	vraiment	truly, really
seule	seulement	only
naturelle	naturellement	naturally

16.2 Adverbial Phrases

Adverbial phrases are prepositional phrases that modify a verb or predicate (verb phrase), describing the "when", "where", "how" of some event or condition. For form, see Section 15; for function, see below; for order, just note that adverbial phrases are necessarily relatively long and therefore tend to be at the beginning or end of a sentence or clause.

Function

As we said above, all adverbials function as modifiers and all have a wide range of uses. It is true, however, that certain adverbials are more likely to occur in certain positions/functions, as you'll see in 16.3.

16.3 Modifying Adjectives or Other Adverbials

For this function, the adverb most often is one of the intensifiers, like très, fort, bien (colloquially, vachement, terriblement) and almost always directly precedes the word it modifies.

Il est très malade.	He is very sick.
J'ai très mal compris.	I very badly misunderstood.
Ça, c'est fort intéressant.	That's very interesting.

16.4 Modifying the Verb

In the majority of cases, one-word adverbs directly follow the verb that they modify. If the verb has a noun as its direct object, that noun may precede the adverb. If the verb form is compound (e.g., passé composé) some adverbs may occur between the auxiliary and the past participle. There is no neat word-order rule and you should not focus on that question at this level.

Il parle lentement.	He speaks slowly.
Elle a vite compris.	She quickly* understood.*
Elle nous a parlé sérieusement.	She spoke to us seriously.
Vous parlez bien (le)¹⁵ français.	You speak French well.
Il nous chante doucement.	He sings sweetly* (softly) to us.*

¹⁵ We place the le in parentheses because, as a rule, names of languages after the verb parler are not preceded by le, except when there is an adverb or other word/phrase between parler and the name of the language. Current usage appears to be leaning toward omitting le even when there is a (short) word in that position.

16.5 Modifying the Verb Phrase/Predicate/Sentence

If you just think about the meaning, it is usually fairly easy to see when an adverb modifies the whole verb phrase or sentence: the "range" of modification is greater than it is for words that directly modify just the action of the verb. Note the following examples of sentence-adverbs:

Nous ferons nos devoirs demain.	We'll do our homework tomorrow.
Demain il va nous dire la vérité.	Tomorrow, he'll tell us the truth.
Il a mis les livres sur le banc.	He put the books on the bench.
Elle est partie sans nous parler.	She left without speaking to us.

16.6 Interrogative Adverbs

Like all interrogative words, the interrogative adverbs have two functions: (1) they signal that this is a question of the "information-requesting" type (not a "yes/no" question) and (2) they are adverbial modifiers. They can be classified according to certain restrictions on word order and we'll give some of those here, but will not include exercises to elicit those niceties in the text: that is an intermediate-level matter.

Most commonly, one uses est-ce que and normal word order with interrogative adverbs. We recommend you use est-ce que regularly when you produce such questions except when you have acquired, through frequent use, easy inversion forms, such as "Comment allez-vous?"

Où est-ce que Jean est allé?	Where did John go?
Pourquoi est-ce que le professeur cherchait sa serviette?	Why was the professor looking for his briefcase?
Combien ce livre a-t-il coûté?	How much did this book cost?
Quand est-ce que tu pars pour la France?	When are you leaving for France?

The following interrogative adverbs may be followed by inversion of a noun subject with the verb, if the verb is simple (not compound).

Où va Jean?	Where is John going?
Combien vaut ce diamant?	How much is this diamond worth?
Comment va Marie?	How is Mary?

Colloquially, one may hear an interrogative adverb followed by regular word order.

Combien tu as payé cette voiture?

How much did you pay for this car?