Negative adverbials followed by an inverted verb – answers to exercise 4

7 Under no circumstances should credit cards be made available to students on low incomes.
8 Seldom do young people get into this level of debt.
9 Never before has the school involved parents on school trips.
10 Never before have I experienced such generosity from people.
11 Not only had our son’s friends helped themselves to food and drink, (but) they had also not even washed up after themselves!
12 Never before has the Managing Director wanted the audit finished by mid-March.

(Notice here that the present tense verb has had to go into the present perfect because of the sense of the negative adverbial. Eg. Never in the past 10 years have I felt so optimistic about winning an Olympic medal…..)

 

 

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