Adverbs of comment and manner

Adverbs are frequently used to give more information about verbs. In other words, adverbs often tell us how things happen.

Examples:

• They run fast. How do they run? - fast
• She paints beautifully. How does she paint? - beautifully
• He quickly finished his breakfast. How did he finish? - quickly

Adverbs of comment add information about the speaker’s opinion. They do not usually give information about how something happened. These adverbs modify the complete sentence.

Compare these sentences:

1. She started dancing happily. (adverb of manner)
2. Happily, she started dancing. (comment adverb)

Sentence 1 gives more information about how she was singing.

Sentence 2 gives the speaker’s opinion.

Position of adverbs of manner:

You can place these adverbs in two different ways:

After the main verb.

• They run fast.
• She paints beautifully.

Before the verb to add emphasis.

• He calmly announced that his father had passed away.