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Grammar
Objective: Apply subject-verb inversion after initial adverbs such as peut-être, sans doute, à peine, and aussi in formal written French.
| Adverb | Register | Inverted example |
|---|---|---|
| peut-être | formal writing | Peut-être est-il déjà parti. |
| sans doute | formal writing | Sans doute a-t-elle oublié le rendez-vous. |
| à peine | formal writing | À peine était-il entré que le téléphone a sonné. |
| aussi (consequently) | formal writing | Aussi a-t-il décidé de rester. |
| en vain | literary |
At the head of a sentence peut-être calls for inversion in formal writing, and the plain order belongs to informal speech.
A noun subject stays in place, and a matching pronoun follows the verb, so the noun and the verb are not separated.
The adverb opens the sentence, the verb follows, and the pronoun subject closes the group.
sans doute at the head of a sentence belongs to formal writing, and the pronoun follows the auxiliary.
The adverb à peine opens the sentence, and the second clause begins with que.
In this meaning aussi translates as consequently and takes the inverted order.
The noun subject stays before the verb, and the pronoun il repeats it after the verb.
7 exercises · about 11 minutes
Aussi meaning consequently requires inversion at the head of a sentence, while the same adverb with the meaning also does not.
At the head of a sentence sans doute calls for inversion in formal writing, while speech prefers sans doute que with normal word order.
The added pronoun elle agrees with the feminine noun directrice.
The literary adverb en vain takes the same inverted order.
The fixed formula encore faut-il keeps the inversion as part of the expression.