Position - Adverbs of manner

Once you learn the basic facts about adverbs (form, function, comparison etc.) what remains is to learn where to place them in a sentence. You will probably find somewhat difficult to remember all of the rules related to their position (I know I have), but you don't need to worry too much. The more we use English the better we get at it. For a start, you will improve your language by remembering at least those rules that apply to most adverbs or which correspond with your own language, later on you can build up your knowledge bit by bit. I myself will benefit a lot from revising this not at all easy area, although adverbials (a word or group of words with an adverbial meaning -manner, time etc.) offer more flexibility than other sentence constituents (subject, predicate etc.).

All the information here is taken from the so-called pedagogical grammar (such as Thomson-Martinet's one) and some other sources (such as Oxford or Cambridge dictionaries). I will not be using Quirk's grammar to further elaborate the syntactic features of adverbs (or rather adverbials) in order not to make this post overwhelming and confusing rather than helpful and useful. And to remind you once again, I myself am a recent graduate in English (non-native speaker) so I cannot claim to have an undisputed excellence in English, however, I do have a great passion for learning languages and believe that to learn a language one must use it as much as possible. If we do not use a language we are learning because we are afraid of mistakes, there is a great chance we will never become fluent speakers of that language.

A small hint: If you don't have time to check a certain rule in grammar textbooks or dictionaries when in doubt about your sentence, a good thing to do is to google your sentence and see how often such a construction comes up and on what kind of sites (reliable or unreliable in terms of grammar).

Now, let's go on with the hard work. I will write you here what I have found in grammar textbooks (Thomson-Martinet mostly) about the position of adverbs of manner. As you probably know, adverbs of manner are adverbs which describe the manner in which something was done and reply to how?.

1) VERB or VERB + OBJECT

First of all, you normally place an adverb of manner after the verb or an object if there is one, but you do not put it between the verb and its object:

* after the verb:
- He spoke softly.                           
- She sang beautifully.                      
- She prayed silently.                             

The adverbs (bold) modify verbs (underlined).

* after the object:
- I sat and watched everyone very closely.
- She closed the door softly behind her.
- They opened the box quietly.

The adverbs (bold) come after the objects (underlined) but they still modify the verbs.

* If you remember, their function is to modify a verb, an adverb or an adjective and some modify whole clauses. http://enya-books.blogspot.com/2012/03/adverbs.html

However, if the object is long then we normally place the adverb before the verb:

- He angrily denied that he attempted to kill his wife. (the object is underlined)
- She carefully planned the last few days of her stay in London.


* You do not put an adverb between the verb and  the object:

- They opened quietly the box.
-  She closed softly the door behind her.

2) VERB + PREPOSITION + OBJECT

Many verbs in English are followed by certain prepositions - some are followed by only one preposition (insist (up)on, accuse of, attend to etc.), while others can be followed by several prepositions (listen to/in on/, look at/for/into/on etc.).
In a construction verb + preposition + object we can place the adverb either after the object or before the preposition:

- I listened to her story carefully. (V + prep. + O + A) or
- I listened carefully to her story. (V + A + prep. + O)
- He replied to my letter quickly.
- He replied quickly to my letter

* This should not be confused with the incorrect construction V + adverb + O (e. g. He spoke fluently English) because, as you can see, this is not a verb followed with a preposition!

Once again, if the object is long (containing several words) it affects the position of the adverb -we put the adverb before the preposition:

- I listened carefully to her story about the adventures in Africa. (the object is underlined)
- He replied quickly to my letter I sent him in a fit of anger.



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Note:
A long object in verb + object sentences : adverb is put before the verb
A long object in verb + preposition + object : adverb is put before the preposition (after the verb).

The latter does not break the important rule that we do not put an adverb between the verb and object as there is a preposition before the object.

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3) CLAUSE/PHRASE + ADVERB

When an adverb is placed after a clause or phrase then it normally modifies the verb in that clause/phrase. This is important to know when dealing with complex sentences (with more than one clause) or with long subjects or objects, for example.

- They secretely decided to leave the town. (the underlined object is a clause)
- They secretely decided it. (the decision was secret so when we replace the object with the pronoun it, that meaning is quite obvious)

- They decided to leave the town secretely. (the object is underlined; the leaving is secret)
- They decided it.

4 ) ADVERBS CONCERNED WITH CHARACTER AND INTELLIGENCE

There are adverbs of manner which describe character or intelligence and whose position before or after the verb greatly affects their meaning. Some of these adverbs are stupidly, kindly, foolishly, generously etc.

* before the verb:

- He kindly waited for me. (= It was kind of him to wait for me.)
- He generously paid for us all. (= It was generous of him to pay us.)

In these examples, the adverbs describe what the action was like, not how it was done. Therefore, the be + adjective + (of object) + infinitive construction can be used to express the same meaning.

* after the verb:

- He spoke kindly. (It was kind of him to speak to us. but his voice and words were kind)
- He paid us generously. (It was generous of him to pay. but the amount of money he gave was generous, bigger than expected)

In these examples the adverbs describe how the action was done, not what it was like in our opinion.

Another great example used in Thomson-Martinet grammar to further highlight the difference in meaning arising from the different position of these adverbs is the following:

- He foolishly answered the questions. (It was foolish of him to answer. He shouldn't have done it.)
- He answered the questions foolishly. (He gave foolish answers. I expected more of him.)


5) BADLY AND WELL

These adverbs are interesting as they can be used as both adverbs of manner and adverbs of degree.

As adverbs of manner they both come before the past participle in passive sentences, and after the verb or object in the active sentences:

- The country has been badly affected by the recession. (before past participle)
- The excursion was well organised.

- The kids all behaved well. (after an active verb)
- I did badly in my exams.

- He didn't play the guitar badly at all. (after an object)
- She spoke French well.

As adverbs of degree:

well has the same positions as an adverb of manner or degree.
badly (degree) has two same positions as badly (manner): it comes after the object or before the past participle , but badly as an adverb of degree comes before (not after) the verb:

- I would like the steak well done. (before the p.p.)
- Put the powder into the water and shake well. (after an active verb)
- Knead the dough well. (after the object)

- The door needs a coat of paint badly. (after the object)
- The door badly needs a coat of paint. (before the verb)
- He was badly injured. (before the p.p.)

* p.p. = past participle

Again, you should be aware of the fact that different positions of adverbs may produce sentences with different meanings:

- You know well that I cannot drive.  (You know this for sure. well - degree )
- You know that I cannot drive well. (I don't drive well. well - manner )

* In the first example, we have the verb + adverb + object construction. This construction is considered ungrammatical when it comes to adverbs of manner, but well here is an adverb of degree.


may/might/can/could well emphasize the probability of an action or that there is a good reason for something:

- You may well be right. (You are probably right.)
- I couldn't very well refuse to help them, could I?

can/could well = easily:

- She could well afford it.


6) SOMEHOW, ANYHOW

The only thing specific to somehow is that it can have the front position as well as the usual positions for adverbs of manner (after the verb, or after the object):

- Somehow they managed. (the front position)
- They managed somehow. (after the verb)
- They raised the money somehow. (after the object)

Anyhow is not common as an adverb of manner, but it is frequently used in the sense in any case/anyway.

- She piled the papers in a heap on her desk, just anyhow. (adverb of manner)
- I don't have time to go and anyhow it's too expensive. (anyhow = anyway)