Re: Adverbs VS Prepositional phrases

Those prepositional phrases are called adverbial phrases. (: Just like how
"a flower in the colour of blood" contains a prepositional, adjectival
phrase. They essentially serve the same purpose, but yes, the part of speech
does not need explicitly to be there.
Eugene

On Tue, Oct 28, 2008 at 6:37 PM, Gary Shannon <fiziwig@...> wrote:

> I was analyzing some sentences and it occurred to me that adverbs can be
> turned into prepositional phrases. A conlang could do well without any
> adverbs at all.
>
> Consider:
>
> He ran slowly. => He ran [IN a slow manner].
> It rains frequently. => It rains [AT frequent intervals].
> I'm happy now. => I'm happy [AT this time].
>
> I also noticed that adjectives, in some cases, really act more like verbs
> in that they can take prepositional phrases that are not related to the
> actual verb. In those cases the verb could be changed into an adverb (or
> prepositional phrase), and the adjective turned into a verb:
>
> He seems worried about X. => He seemingly worries about X.
> He looks happy about X. => He apparently does-happy about X
> He is interested in X. => He has-interest in X.
>
> The prepositional phrase really belongs to the adjective, not to the verb.
> In "He is interested in X." "he" is not "is-ing in X", so the prepositional
> phrase does not modify anything about the action of the verb at all.
>
> I'm not sure whether prepositional phrases can always be turned into
> adverbs, but it seems that may be possible too:
>
> With great courage they advanced on the enemy. =>
> Very courageously they advanced enemy-ward.
>
> I ran past the window. => I ran window-passingly.
>
> I'm not sure what it's worth, but I just thought it was an interesting
> observation that is seems a conlang could use either adverbs OR
> prepositional phrases, but would not need both.
>
> --gary
>