Is this message clear?

This needs a lot of work, oristarA. Are you looking for help on a school assignment?

Hi Oristar, Overall the content is clear. I understand what is being said. But there are many mistakes in English. Do you want me to go over them for you?

Yes, Roberta, I need it very much. Because in fact I am so eager to improve the writing!
TIA.

Re: Is this message clear?
Oristar, It will be less time-consuming for me to simply correct the errors. I hope this won't be a problem for you.


[quote="oristarA
Magician Blaine Suspected OF Fraud; He Hasn't GotTEN Thin after Having Fasted for 20 Days


SINCE SEPTEMBER 6, American magician David Blaine has BEEN in a transparent plastic quadrate box SUSPENDED in the air on the side of Tower Bridge, London. SurprisINGLY, HE DOES not look thinNER in any way. People HAVE BEGUN to suspect THAT he has been drinking some HIGH-PROTEIN liquid.

IT IS common sense TO ASSUME, THAT ONLY drinking water AND NOT eating any food for 20 days, Blaine WOULD lose A LOT OF weight and look gaunt. HOWEVER, he may, IN FACT, have gained several pounds, AND he looks ???? (ORISTAR--WHAT DOES HEAVILY FRESHED MEAN?). His pectoral muscles look meaty, AND his face DOES NOT APPEAR THINNER THAN IT WAS BEFORE THE STUNT BEGAN. IT SHOULD BE NOTED, though, THAT his eye sockets HAVE darkened.

SPECTATORS' suspicion:

British SPECTATORS HAVE BEGUN to WONDER whether someone IS SNEAKING some LIQUID NOURISHMENT to Blaine through HIS drinking water pipe or thE trash PIPE. SPECTATORS CLAIM THAT "He looks meaty!" The Sky TV Station, Britain, WHICH HAS organizeD (O--OK OR WOULD "SPONSORED" BE BETTER?) the STUNT, STATES firmly:"He(Blaine) just drinks water!" (O--IS THE EXCLAMATION POINT PART OF THE QUOTE? IF IT IS, THEN IT'S IN THE RIGHT PLACE.)

Expert's explanation:

A British health expert SUSPECTS that David Blaine has HAD ACCESS TO HIGH-PROTEIN LIQUID FOODS. He points out:" Blaine just consumes 90-800 calories per day since he keeps inactive like this in the box. He can gain weight if his daily intake of the liquid food is up to 1000 calories. While only drinking water, even a strong athlete would lose weight."[/quote]


That's it, Oristar. If you have any questions, please let me know.

BTW, this was quite long. I don't know whether I'll be able to respond to such long questions in the future. (I'm getting busy with work.) I'll try to help as best I can.

It will be less time-consuming for me to simply correct the errors.

That is what I'm used to expect, Roberta! Because I always worry about that my request will cost you too much time. And now, it is a relief for me to hear you say so.

(1) Got should be GotTEN
Originally, I did want to use "gotten" instead of "got", but AHD indicates: Got: Past tense and a past participle of get. I thought "got" looks somewhat terse than "gotten", so I decided to use "got".

(2) "BEEN" instead of "spent"
Cool! Very accurate!
In addition, putting "Since September 6" in the front of the sentence is more suitable for English writing custom. Yes!

(3) Adding SUSPENDED
Clearer! It seems that I have had a vague presentiment about "in the air" is not enough to depict accurately the situation. Now you've corrected me , thanks.

(4) SurprisINGLY instead of Surprised

If I used "Surprisedly", would it work well?

(5) Okay, figure is redundant; and "thinNER" has been to the point.

(6) "HAVE BEGUN" instead of "begin"
A stronger expression!
(7) "That" instead of "if"
Smooth!

(8) HIGH-PROTEIN liquid
Terse!

(9) IT IS common sense TO ASSUME, THAT ONLY
Sorry, I have not gotten the correction now. (Mind hesitating ... I will try to find some reasons to prove the expression "as a common sense" works...)

(10) AND NOT instead of "without"

It seems I don't know how to use "without" properly.

A side note: if a correction that I don't comment on it here, that means I've accepted the correction.

(11) ORISTAR--WHAT DOES HEAVILY FRESHED MEAN?

See AHD the term "meaty (8)": Heavily fleshed. It approx equals "full of meat".

(12) AND his face DOES NOT APPEAR THINNER THAN IT WAS BEFORE THE STUNT BEGAN. IT SHOULD BE NOTED, though, THAT his eye sockets HAVE darkened.
Very good!

(13) SPECTATORS' instead of Audience

YES! More accurate!

(14) What a SNEAKING!

How cool!

(15) SPONSORED may be better, I guess.

(16) STATES firmly instead of "declares firmly"

Yeah, I don't know to use "declare" properly.

(17) (O--IS THE EXCLAMATION POINT PART OF THE QUOTE? IF IT IS, THEN IT'S IN THE RIGHT PLACE.)

Do you mean "IS THE EXCLAMATION POINTing PART OF THE QUOTE?"

What I meant is "He(Blaine) just drinks water! = Blaine just drinks water!"

(18) A British health expert SUSPECTS that David Blaine has HAD ACCESS TO HIGH-PROTEIN LIQUID FOODS.

The rewriting is very good. It seems the thing Blaine is doing cannot be "reasoned out", just can be "suspected", cos we don't actually catch out the evidence that he is really doing foul play.

(19) BTW, this was quite long. I don't know whether I'll be able to respond to such long questions in the future. (I'm getting busy with work.) I'll try to help as best I can.

Please Just feel free to help me out! However, never have I tried to drag someone from her/his work to give me a hand.Because God will help me . Frankly, I will write longer message or article to seek help here. But if you would like to analyze some paragraphs of my writing, I will be grateful.

Thanks for correcting.

Oristar,

(1) Got should be GotTEN
Originally, I did want to use "gotten" instead of "got", but AHD indicates: Got: Past tense and a past participle of get. I thought "got" looks somewhat terse than "gotten", so I decided to use "got". YES, GOT IS MORE TERSE THAN GOTTEN. IT'S ALSO WRONG IN THIS CONTEXT.

(4) SurprisINGLY instead of Surprised

If I used "Surprisedly", would it work well? NO, THERE'S NO SUCH WORD AS SURPRISEDLY.

(9) IT IS common sense TO ASSUME, THAT ONLY
Sorry, I have not gotten the correction now. (Mind hesitating ... I will try to find some reasons to prove the expression "as a common sense" works...) THE COMPOUND NOUN "COMMON SENSE" DOES NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, TAKE AN ARTICLE. HENCE, "A COMMON SENSE" WILL NEVER WORK. SORRY.

(10) AND NOT instead of "without"

It seems I don't know how to use "without" properly. YOU DIDN'T USE "WITHOUT" IMPROPERLY. "AND NOT" JUST WORKS BETTER HERE.
(11) ORISTAR--WHAT DOES HEAVILY FRESHED MEAN?

See AHD the term "meaty (8)": Heavily fleshed. It approx equals "full of meat". "HEAVILY FLESHED" SOUNDS ALMOST LIKE AN ARCHAIC TERM. I WOULDN'T USE IT IF I WERE YOU. "MEATY" IS NOT A TERM THAT'S USED IN REFERRING TO PEOPLE. A PROBLEM MAY BE MEATY, A DISCUSSION MAY BE MEATY, A RECIPE MAY BE MEATY. BUT PEOPLE MAY BE FLESHY, BEEFY, OR WELL FILLED OUT. HOWEVER, EACH OF THESE EXPRESSIONS HAS A VERY SPECIFIC MEANING THAT DOESN'T APPLY HERE. I'VE SEEN DAVID BLAINE ON TV. I WOULDN'T CALL HIM BEEFY. HE'S THIN. MUSCLES WOULD NEVER LOOK MEATY. THEY LOOK SOLID, BIG, BULGY. WE ARE DEALING WITH NUANCES OF LANGUAGE HERE, AND THEY'RE HARD TO EXPLAIN. SORRY.

(17) (O--IS THE EXCLAMATION POINT PART OF THE QUOTE? IF IT IS, THEN IT'S IN THE RIGHT PLACE.)

Do you mean "IS THE EXCLAMATION POINTing PART OF THE QUOTE?"

What I meant is "He(Blaine) just drinks water! = Blaine just drinks water!"

AN EXCLAMATION POINT IS A PUNCTUATION MARK (!). WHEN YOU USE AN EXCLAMATION POINT WITH QUOTATION MARKS, YOU NEED TO BE SURE TO PUT THE EX. PT. IN THE RIGHT PLACE. IF IT'S INSIDE THE QU. MK., IT'S ATTRIBUTED TO THE SPEAKER; IF IT'S OUTSIDE, IT'S ATTRIBUTED TO THE WRITER.

Sorry I couldn't be more specific in some of my responses. I'm not all that knowledgeable about terms for tenses.

Hi Roberta,

There are at least 3 dictionaries embodying the word "surprisedly". But these dictionaries are all not native English dictionary, there are all like this: English-Other Language Dictionary.

Regarding the usage of "common sense", I would like to exactly follow your teaching.

If we don't want to call Blaine "meaty", how about "chubby"? There is a pic of Blaine here, he looks chubby somehow.

I've tried to look for the compound noun "EXCLAMATION POINT" "desperately, but I failed. So I misunderstood it.

Finally. Thanks Roberta.

Hi Oristar,

Re "surprisedly," I looked in my dictionary before I said that the word doesn't exist. It's not in my dictionary. Granted, it's not an unabridged dictionary, but I think the word would be listed if it were a word. Add to this the fact that I never heard of this word. But the ultimate decision is yours.

Re chubby. I don't think that the issue is so much whether Blaine looks beefy or chubby. The issue is one of comparison--how did he look when he went into the box, and how does he look now. If he looked chubby when he went in, it think it would be ok to say that he still looks chubby. (I wouldn't be surprised if he gained weight before the stunt.)

One more thing. The word quadrate is not wrong. But it's a rarely used word. A box, a rectangle, or something similar would be more appropriate.

I've been thinking about the issue of "common sense," trying to come up with an explanation. (I'm not a teacher, so sometimes it's hard for me to put into words the things that I know about English.) I think that common sense doesn't take an article because articles specify what you're referring to. There is only one common sense. Either you have it or you don't.

You're welcome.

If quadrate is rarely used, how about "square" instead of it?
Anyway, I need to read tons of original English works before writing sth.... As a matter of fact, I have to try to write sth. as I try to read as much English works as I can.

We're all welcome?!

Hi Oristar,

A square box would be okay.

What's sth?

You said "thank you," so I said, "you're welcome." I assumed you were familiar with this expression. In French, de rien, in Spanish, de nada. It's just something you say when someone says thanks.