"Away" > "way"

[Arnold Zwicky]

On Feb 3, 2009, at 6:51 AM, Larry Horn wrote:

>> Oddly, I'd expect to encounter "aways better" ("a ways better"?) more
> than "away better".  But since neither is in my own actual
> repertoire, I may be mistaken.

a stunning number of google hits for {"aways better"}, but most of
them seem to be spellings of "always better".  some, however, are
pretty clearly intended to be the adverbial modifier.

the OED has an entry for adverbial "aways" ("away" + adverbial
genitive "-s"), marked as obsolete.  but apparently it lives.  either
a survival, in the spoken language, that went unrecorded for ca. 300
years or a fresh extension of -s in the vernacular.

arnold

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