THE ADVERB

In giving a general review of parts of speech, we have already mentioned some general problems connected with the adverbs. It will be our task now to look at these problems more closely.

We will accept that definition of the meaning of adverbs which, though not quite satisfactory, enables us to distinguish what is an adverb from what is not. The adverb, then, expresses either the degree of a property, or the property of an action, or the circumstances under which an action takes place.

In adopting this definition, we have not included under adverbs words expressing the speaker's view of the action spoken of in the sentence, and have classed them under modal words. Thus, the words perhaps, maybe, certainly, possibly, indeed, etc. do not fall under the head of adverbs.

Among the adverbs there are some which admit of degrees of comparison, and others which do not. In mentioning this, we need not go into details, since we can apply here everything that has been said about degrees of comparison of adjectives. Thus, if we do not admit such phrases as more difficult, (the) most difficult to be analytical degrees of comparison of the adjective difficult,¹ we shall not admit, e. g., more quickly and most quickly to be analytical degrees of comparison of the adverb quickly. In that case, there would be only two types of degrees of comparison in adverbs: (1) the suffix type, for instance, quickly, quicker, quickest, or fast, faster, fastest, and (2) the suppletive type, represented by a few adverbs, such as well, better, best, or badly, worse, worst.

Adverbs may sometimes be preceded by prepositions, which means that they become partly substantivised. This is seen in such phrases as from here, from there, since when, up to now, etc.

VERB AND ADVERB GROUPS

Special attention has been paid by many scholars to groups of the type come in, go out, set up, put down, bring up, etc., i. e. groups consisting of a verb and an adverb so closely united in meaning that the adverb does not indicate a property of the action or a circumstance under which the action takes place. This is especially true of such groups as bring up, meaning 'educate', which certainly does not name an action denoted by the verb bring, performed under circumstances denoted by the adverb up. This also applies to such groups as put up (with something), in which nothing remains either of the meaning of the verb put or of that of the adverb up.

¹ See above, p. 80.

 

Verb and Adverb Groups 147

These groups have been treated by different scholars in very different ways. The main difference is between those who think that formations of the type bring up are phrases and those who think that they are words. If they are phrases, the next question is, what part of speech the second element is. The prevailing view is that the second element is an adverb, but some scholars think it necessary to modify this statement in some way or other. Thus, H. Palmer thinks that they are "preposition-like adverbs". ¹ Much the same view was held by Prof. A. Smirnitsky.² Prof. I. Anitchkov thinks that they are a special kind of adverbs, which he calls "adverbial postpositions".³ Prof. N. Amosova thinks that they are a special kind of form words, which she calls "postpositives".⁴ The opposite view, namely that formations of the type bring up are words, and consequently their second part is a morpheme, was expressed by Y. Zhluktenko.⁵ In his view, up in bring up and similarly the second element of other formations of this kind are "pospositive prefixes". To support this view, Zhluktenko pointed out that in some cases we find such correspondences as income (noun) and come in (verb), upbringing (noun) and bring up (verb), upkeep (noun) and keep up (verb), etc. An intermediate view was proposed in my earlier book, where I held that the second element of these formations was a separate part of speech, namely a postposition, and that postpositions were half words, half morphemes. ⁶ The very variety of views on the subject is a sure sign of its complexity.

In approaching the subject now from the viewpoint of present-day linguistics, we cannot accept the view that the second part of these formations is a morpheme and the whole formation a word. If this were really so, phrases, like brought them up or put it down would be impossible. Y. Zhluktenko's theory is based on the assumption that there are "analytical words", that is, words consisting of two parts which are not only written separately but may even be separated from each other by another word (such as the personal pronouns in brought them up and put it down). This view is unacceptable, since it would destroy the notion of a "word" altogether.

On the other hand, there seems to be no need to constitute the

¹ H. E. Palmer, A Grammar of Spoken English, 1930, p. 179.

² See А. И. Смирницкий, Морфология английского языка, 1959, стр. 374 сл.

³ See И. E. Аничков, Английские адвербиальные послелоги. Докт. дисс., 1947.

⁴ See H. H. Амосова, Основы английской фразеологии, 1963, стр. 134.

⁵ See Ю. А. Жлуктенко, О так называемых "сложных глаголах" в современном английском языке. Вопросы языкознания, 1954, № 5.

⁶ See Б. А. Ильиш, Современный английский язык, изд. 2-е, 1948, стр. 243 см.

148 The Adverb

postpositions as a separate part of speech. The peculiarity of meaning, seen in the fact that the second element in bring up or put down does not indicate the circumstances in which the action takes place (the whole has a meaning entirely different from the meanings of the components), may be put down as phraseology. In this view, for example, bring up would be a phraseological unit consisting of the verb bring and the adverb up, and the analysis of its meaning would completely fall under the domain of lexicology, of which phraseology is a part.

Another difficulty involved in adverbs is that of words like after and be/ore, which are variously used, e. g. I had never seen him before, I had never seen him before last Sunday, I had never seen him before he arrived in Moscow, similar examples might be given with the word after and some other words. We have treated this problem briefly in the chapter on parts of speech and we will turn to it again in Chapter XIX (see p. 156 ff.).