Not Only … But Also …

Aside from the phrases we practiced on the previous page, there’s one structure in particular that’s typically seen and heard at advanced levels, and using it on exam day will guarantee you some extra grammar points:

Not only _____ , but also _____ .

This structure is an example of negative inversion and one that’s used to add emphasis, formality or dramatic purpose to your language. The topic of inversion is covered in greater detail in the Writing section of the course, but we’re focusing on this inversive structure here since it’s another useful phrase to use for addition.

As it’s a somewhat formal structure, you’re more likely to see it in written rather than spoken English, although using it accurately in your Speaking exam will certainly make the examiners sit up and take notice. For that reason, it’s highly recommended that you walk into the exam feeling confident about using it.

With that very goal in mind, let’s begin by looking at an example of a simple sentence that uses and to connect two clauses:

Tourism benefits the global economy and it helps local communities.

How can we make this sentence more emphatic, formal and dramatic – and more characteristic of C1 level English? You guessed it – we can use negative inversion. Let’s see how.

The very first thing we do is place not only at the beginning of the sentence. Then we identify the subject of the first clause, which in this case is tourism. As this is an uncountable noun, we need to add an uncountable auxiliary verb in front of it – in this case, does.

Not only does tourism

We now add the rest of the first clause:

Not only does tourism benefits the global economy

Can you spot the grammar mistake? We need to correct this by deleting the s in benefits so that the auxiliary verb (does) and the main verb (benefit) agree. In other words, it needs to look like a question!

(Does tourism benefit the global economy?)

Not only does tourism benefit the global economy

We now need to connect the second clause. We do this by adding a comma and the linker but, followed by the subject from the second clause – it. Let’s now add the linker also.

Not only does tourism benefit the global economy, but it also

To finish, we simply add the rest of the second clause – helps local communities.

Not only does tourism benefit the global economy, but it also helps local communities.

And there we have it – we’ve taken a simple sentence and transformed it into an advanced one using negative inversion. Before we move onto some practice exercises, let’s see what other things you need to be aware of when using this structure.