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feel, smell, look, sound + adjective

May 3, 2013 By Nestor Leave a Comment

What is wrong with this sentence?

I feel badly today.

Verbs like feel, sound, look, taste, appear and seem are called sense verbs. In English, we normally use sense verbs with adjectives (“I feel bad today”), not adverbs.

Look at the examples below:

happy woman

She seems happy.

ashamed_2

He feels ashamed.

chocolate cake

It looks delicious.

blackmail

It sounds serious!

When do we use adverbs after sense verbs?

We can use an adverb after some of these verbs when we answer the question How …..?

How did he look at you?

He looked at me angrily.

We can also use the adverb well after look, sound, feel, appear, but the meaning is ‘healthy’.

Tom looks very well after the operation.

The opposite is unwell.

You look unwell today. Is everything all right?

Filed Under: English grammar

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