dragn
Joined: 17 Feb 2009
Posts: 450
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 Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 9:41 am Post subject: |
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Q1:Can we put never in interrogative sentences like these below?
1.Does she never go to school?
2.Is she never tired? |
First off, a quick word of warning. There are very few areas of English grammar that more strenuously resist conforming to strict rules than adverbs of frequency. They represent one of the slipperiest topics in grammar: we put them in various places in different situations for reasons that we are often hard-pressed to explain. So, the best you can do is learn the "tendencies" and beyond that just listen to the way native speakers talk. You'll never get it all from a grammar book. Not all of it.
There may exist grammar books that state authoritatively that we never put never in that position. Well, we do on occasion. No, it's not the "normal" pattern. No, it's not our "tendency." However, the "rules" don't seem to stop educated native speakers from doing it from time to time.
Someone might say the sentence "Does she never go to school?" in a situation where the speaker is amazed at how infrequently the girl in question seems to attend school. It's grammatically equivalent to "Doesn't she ever go to school?" There would be stress on the word never. In effect, it would be an exaggeratedly formal, almost poetic way to express the feeling. We do this sometimes to "elevate" our sentiment. (You see what I mean? I'm hard-pressed to explain it with any degree of precision.) The same thing applies to "Is she never tired?" It's a more elevated or poetic way of saying "Isn't she ever tired?" or "Doesn't she ever get tired?"
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Q2:Can we put often at the beginning in a sentence?
Often she likes to go to the supermarket. |
I've heard native speakers put often at the beginning of sentences before, in both spoken and written English. However, I doubt many would do it in the above sentence. One reason I think it would sound odd here is that it would almost sound as if there were times when she does like to go to the supermarket, and other times when she does not like to go. That doesn't really make very much sense. The only places I would feel comfortable placing the word often in this sentence are after the subject she and at the end of the sentence. The placement does have a slight effect on the meaning, though.
If you say "She often likes to go to the supermarket," the suggestion is that she likes to go to the supermarket, and she goes often. Every couple of days, she feels like going to the store and off she goes.
If you say "She likes to go to the supermarket often," you could be emphasizing that it's the frequency of her trips to the store that she likes. Maybe she really doesn't care that much about going to the supermarket; however, she has to go and for some reason she prefers to go often rather than only once in a while.
There are a number of situations where we might start a sentence with often. For example, we might do it when talking about someone's past habit:
"When I would sleep over at my friend Tim's house, we would always play chess for hours and hours. No TV. No video games. No music. Just chess. Often we would play late into the night, long after his parents had gone to bed."
I searched fairly hard for a web site that really did a good, thorough job with adverbs of frequency, and was actually a bit surprised at how few sites impressed me with their treatment of the topic. However, here's one that's pretty good. I'm hoping others can come up with some that are as good or better.
http://esl.about.com/library/grammar/blgr_adverbs_frequency.htm
Hope this is helpful...it's a difficult topic.
Greg |
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