That is the question.

Authors get a lot of conflicting advice about whether adverbs are good, bad, or the scourge of the earth.  Some top authors recommend against using any adverbs, while a number of bestsellers contain copious amounts, and the debate rages on.  Knowing how to use adverbs is about developing judgment to figure out how they effect the style of your piece.

Adverbs are words that modify verbs or adjectives.  Usually they end in -ly, but several commonly used adverbs, like very, do not.  Outside of fiction, adverbs are frequently used.  In fiction, writing with adverbs can be redundant or lazy.  Take for example, a dialogue attribution on steroids:

“Why are you doing that?” she shouted angrily.

There are two problems with the above sentence: the attribution is overhyped, and the dialogue isn’t pulling its weight.  “Shouted angrily” is overkill, because shouting implies anger.  But, we can also tweak the dialogue to better convey how the character is feeling:

“What the heck are you doing with that hammer?” she shouted.

The sentence is already stronger.  Also, now that we’ve eliminated the redundant adverb, we can change “shouted” to “said” (as the dialogue implies shouting), or do away with the attribution altogether.  It’s much cleaner.

Writers often overuse adverbs instead of getting creative with verbs or adjectives.  Writing thrives on the writer’s vocabulary, and adverbs can be bad shortcuts around more interesting words.

The boy quickly put down the hammer he had been using

to tenderize beef.

The sentence is acceptable, but it’s nothing special.  It’s easy to get more specific and evocative by using a verb other than “put,” also eliminating “quickly.”

The boy dropped the hammer he had been using

to tenderize beef.

While “quickly put” and “dropped” don’t mean exactly the same thing, the rewording strengthens the sentence.  In writing there are infinite possibilities, so writers could use substitutions other than “dropped” to create the evocative, precise meaning they want.

On the flip side, there are several situations where using adverbs is a legitimate stylistic choice.  Dialogue is a good opportunity for writers to use adverbs.  When people speak, they often use adverbs, so including them in your dialogue makes sense.  Just don’t go overboard, and if you must choose between clarity and authenticity of speech, go with clarity.

Another reason to use adverbs is if not using them reduces the elegance of your writing, or obscures its meaning.  Certain adverbs are hard to replace without diluting their effect, especially adverbs like fairly and just, that describe incomplete or partial states.  Take the first line of Breakfast of Champions, by Kurt Vonnegut:

“This is a tale of a meeting of two lonesome, skinny, fairly old white

men on a planet which was dying fast.”

Another writer may have cut “fairly” and more or less preserved the meaning of the sentence, but it is more interesting the way Vonnegut wrote it.  “Fairly old” men are contrasted with the dying planet, suggesting that the old men are in the process of dying, though not in as advanced a state of death as the planet.  Vonnegut also intentionally phrased this opening sentence to be much wordier than it could have been.  See the alternative below:

Two lonesome, skinny, old white men met on a planet

which was dying fast.

The revised sentence is descriptive, but lacks the panache and rhythm of Vonnegut’s.  “Fairly” pulls double duty in the sentence, where it both contrasts the men with the planet and adds a wordiness and rhythm to the sentence.

Unfortunately for writers, there are no easy to follow rules regarding when to use adverbs.  Using them well requires good judgment and a sense of style.  Instead of looking for shortcuts to good writing, develop good judgment by reading widely, especially books from at least several decades ago.  The classics are still in print are for a reason—you know the author’s writing style has not gone out of date.  Plus, you might discover some amazing writing you previously knew nothing about.