Josie’s Guide to Syntax: Adverbs & Me (pt. 2)
Cats can have a little adverb, as a treat
Following my previous adverbial adventures (part 1 here).
Eliminating adverbs served as one of my first tangible instruments in my earlier writing toolkit. Ctrl-F became my BFF. Upon agreeing with a draft’s penultimate status, my go to search & cuts included:
-that
-just
-very
and in general: -ly.
‘Really’ claimed the most repeat offenses.
It’s not really that every single ‘ly’ word extremely prevented my drafts from being extraordinarily good, mostly. It’s just that if I used them way too frequently, they really, incredibly slowed down the writing very, very much. Like the use of passive voice really, consistently, it was just found that really, unbelievably often that it was hardly ever a very, exceptionally helpful part-of-speech, even when I just really, truly tried my absolute best.
When writing deploys adverbs skillfully, the text awakens. However, the key lies in using them judiciously and purposefully, as demonstrated in the following examples. Where sentences flowed slowly, they dance. Writers more precisely establish meaning not only to readers but to themselves. Self-knowledge once…
