When do we use inversion?
1: When we use a negative adverb or adverb phrase at
the beginning of the sentence.
• Seldom have I seen such beautiful work.
• (This sentence emphasizes what beautiful
work it is.)
• I have seldom seen such beautiful work.
Hardly had I got into bed when the telephone
Hardly
rang.
Never had she seen such a beautiful sight
Never
before.
Seldom do we see such an amazing display of
Seldom
dance.
Rarely Rarely will you hear such beautiful music.
Only then did I understand why the tragedy
Only then
had happened.
Not only does he love chocolate and
Not only ... but
sweets but he also smokes.
No sooner had we arrived home than the
No sooner
police rang the doorbell.
Scarcely had I got off the bus when it
Scarcely
crashed into the back of a car.
Only later Only later did she really think about the
situation.
Nowhere have I ever had such bad
Nowhere service.
Little Little did he know!
Only in this way Only in this way could John earn enough
money to survive.
In no way do I agree with what you're
In no way saying.
On no account On no account should you do anything
without asking me first.
In the following expressions, the inversion comes in the
second part of the sentence:
Not until I saw John with my
Not until own eyes did I really believe
he was safe.
Not since Lucy left college
Not since had she had such a
wonderful time.
Only after I'd seen her flat
Only after did I understand why she
wanted to live there.
Only when Only when we'd all arrived home did I feel calm.
Only by Only by working extremely hard could we afford to eat.
We only use inversion when the adverb modifies the whole
phrase and not when it modifies the noun:
Hardly anyone passed the exam. (No inversion.)
2: We can use inversion instead of 'if' in conditionals
with 'had' 'were' and 'should'. This is quite formal:
• Normal conditional: If I had been there, this problem
wouldn't have happened.
• Conditional with inversion: Had I been there, this
problem wouldn't have happened.
• Normal conditional: If we had arrived sooner, we
could have prevented this tragedy!
• Conditional with inversion: Had we arrived sooner, we
could have prevented this tragedy!
3: We can use inversion if we put an adverbial
expression of place at the beginning on the
sentence. This is also quite formal or literary:
• On the table was all the money we had lost.
(Normal sentence: All the money we had lost
was on the table.)
• Round the corner came the knights. (Normal
sentence: The knights came round the corner.)
We can use inversion after 'so + adjective...that':
• So beautiful was the girl that nobody could talk of
anything else. (Normal sentence: the girl was so
beautiful that nobody could talk of anything else.)
• So delicious was the food that we ate every last
bite. (Normal sentence: the food was so delicious
that we ate every last bite.)
• Inversion can happen after here, and
after there when it is as an adverb of place.
After here and there, we can use a main verb
without an auxiliary verb or modal verb:
• Here comes the bus!
• Here’s your coffee.
• I opened the door and there stood Michael, all
covered in mud.
• She looked out and there was Pamela, walking
• Expressions beginning with not
• We also invert the subject and verb after not + a
prepositional phrase or a clause in initial
position:
• Not for a moment did I think I would be offered
the job, so I was amazed when I got it.
• Not till I got home did I realise my wallet was
missing