Stephen King said the road to hell is paved with adverbs. It’s hard to argue with a man who’s sold more than 350 million books, and countless writing teachers and bloggers have dutifully reiterated his advice – many more vehemently than Mr King himself. But the adverb is one of the essential tools of effective professional writing. Why does it get such bad press?
Adverbs, of course, are words that modify or add descriptive context to a verb, or to another adverb or adjective. The form of adverb that springs to most people’s minds is the adverb of manner, formed by the addition of an –ly suffix to an adjective.
- He responded promptly. (adverb modifying verb)
- His response was particularly prompt. (adverb modifying adjective)
- He responded unusually promptly. (adverb modifying another adverb)
But many adverbs do not take this form, and they play an irreplaceable role in everyday language – identifying time, place, frequency, direction and degree of action.
- I will respond now.
- I will respond further.
- I will respond to all the questions together.
Other adverbs lacking the telltale –ly ending include quite, very, soon, before, after, later, always, never, often, most, least… And then there are phrasal adverbs, which use more than one word to perform the adverbial function.
- I will respond in person.
- I will respond after due consideration.
- I will respond as instructed.
Obviously cutting adverbs altogether (there’s two in this sentence so far, and ‘so far’ is another) would deprive you of a valuable literary device. And this is not what Mr King suggests. Instead, he takes aim in On Writing: A Memoir on the Craft at a tendency of novelists to rely too heavily on adverbs of manner, which he sees as a symptom of timid or lazy style.
Good prose, he argues, shouldn’t require adverbs to describe action for the reader. Good prose uses context to imply the qualities of the action, or employs well-chosen verbs with inherent qualities. A writer should prefer snarled, hissed, or roared, to ‘said angrily’; a reader would rather see staggered, tottered or reeled, than ‘walked unsteadily’.
Certainly adverbs can be overdone, particularly in creative writing. English provides a rich banquet; why offer readers a meagre diet of bland verbs spiced only with adjectives? But professional writing often prefers a plain bill of fare. Rightly or wrongly readers associate objectivity with sober restraint in the choice of verbs. You can use said, suggested, announced, asserted, commended, conversed or outlined without raising any eyebrows; but use enunciated, hazarded, declaimed, propounded, lauded, palavered or adumbrated and you risk perceptions of frivolity undermining your message. And relying on context to imply the qualities of an action gives your readers leeway to interpret – and therefore misinterpret – your meaning.
So adverbs may be your only option for adding precision to your message. But they should be used judiciously. How do you decide if an adverb would add value to your writing? Like diamonds, adverbs can be evaluated using four Cs – colour, clarity, control and courtesy.
Colour can be hard to achieve within the limits of a professional idiom. When using more colourful verbs may appear eccentric, a striking adverb may be the only tool available for crafting a memorable sentence, something to distinguish your message from others written in the same constrained style. Consider:
- Market stability is based on unpredictable continuity in demand.
- Market stability is precariously based on continuity in demand.
Both sentences are about risk, but the sense of risk is conveyed more strongly by the adverb precariously in the second sentence; the first relies on the reader to infer the element of risk from the adjective unpredictable. And the second sentence has more dramatic impact. It’s more likely to stand out, to be noted and remembered by the reader.
Clarity is essential to your message, and the crux of clarity is limiting the interpretations open to the reader. With a limited vocabulary, this can sometimes be achieved only by using adverbs. Consider:
- The new policy will result in a high level of delegation.
As it stands, this says nothing about whether a high level of delegation is a good thing or a bad thing. If that’s your message, fine. But if you want your reader to understand that it’s a bad thing, don’t rely on them to infer it from the context. A value-laden adverb steers your reader toward your meaning and away from alternative meanings.
- The new policy will result in an unacceptably high level of delegation.
- Unfortunately, the new policy will result in a high level of delegation.
Control is one of your most important tasks as a writer. Closely linked to clarity, it goes to the heart of your job: influencing your reader’s perception of the world. While clarity affects the ways your reader might interpret your message, control affects the ways they might respond to your message. Consider:
- Certainly under-capitalisation has dangerously discouraged investment.
While they may not close down all argument, adverbs like certainly, obviously or self-evidently can make your assertion look like a conclusion rather than a premise. The certainty may be entirely spurious, but that certainly places the burden of argument onto your reader – or onto any source of information which is competing with your message. And that value-laden dangerously places the onus on the reader to say how and why the impact on investment could be managed. Other adverbs perform similar roles – qualifiers like possibly or potentially, for example, assist you in passing off to the reader any responsibility for deciding whether your information is concrete enough to require action.
Another aspect of control is the flagging function adverbs can perform. Words like oddly or bizarrely let the reader know that you recognise the incongruity of what you are describing. On the other hand, an adverb like further or additionally warns the reader you are introducing information connected to what preceded it and prevents them from losing the thread of your argument.
Courtesy is particularly important for written interaction with clients. Adverbs are often necessary to convey to the client the qualities of your actions, which in turn reassures the client they are being treated appropriately. Consider:
- Your request has been considered and rejected.
A bit blunt? A few adverbs can soften the blow.
- Your request has been carefully considered and unfortunately has been rejected.
These adverbs don’t add much in the way of clarity or colour. What they do add is assurance that the client’s interests were taken into account, and that his or her feelings are recognised. These are simple niceties, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t important to shaping your client’s view of the world – and of you. Courtesy, like clarity, colour and control, allows you to influence your reader’s state of mind – which is the purpose of writing.
