Written by pencil...

Forums: English, Esl, Grammar, Vocabulary, English Grammar
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"Written by pencil on the notepad quite some time ago, the numbers and letters are hard to distinguish"

I need your input on the sentence above. Before I go any further, a bit of background story: I contribute to a Korean discussion board that is very similar to A2K. There is this guy who answers every single question on English. This is his profile:

"a full-time painter / a part-time English tutor. MFA(Master of Fine Arts) at PAFA(USA) / BFA(Bachelor of Fine Arts) at UPenn(USA) ........... major: painting / minor: English"

Anyways... his sentence I quoted above is supposed to be a translation from Korean, meaning:
1. Numbers and letters were written "by" pencil on a notebook.
2. It's been a long time since the text was written.
3. So it faded away and now it's hard to see what's written on the notebook.

My questions are:
1. Any grammatical errors?
2. Is 'distinguish' a right choice of word given the original meaning?
3. Anything else that sounds off?
4. Does this sentence represent a well-spoken native English speaker that he claims to be? He often emphasizes that he's Korean only on the outside and he talks and thinks like an American.

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Type: Question • Score: 2 • Views: 972 • Replies: 8

View best answer, chosen by Jaqen

@Jaqen,

1. No, it is fine.
2. Yes, that is a good word.
3. No. I might have said "Written in pencil" but there is nothing wrong with how it is written.
4. Hard to tell on a single sentence, but I don't see anything suspicious here.

1 Reply

@engineer,

I would also have said "written in pencil" .

Distinguish is fine.

1 Reply

Agreed - 'written in pencil' is more idiomatic, but the remainder is just fine as it is.

0 Replies

@Lordyaswas,

I thought 'distinguish' has something to do with telling A from B. What the original Korean text was trying to say was that the letters & numbers have faded and they're not legible (?).

1 Reply

@Jaqen,

It also means that you can manage to discern (something barely perceptible).

1 Reply

@Lordyaswas,

Oh I see thanks!

0 Replies

@Jaqen,

Some of the previous advice is incorrect.

My questions are:
1. Any grammatical errors?
2. Is 'distinguish' a right choice of word given the original meaning?
3. Anything else that sounds off?
4. Does this sentence represent a well-spoken native English speaker that he claims to be? He often emphasizes that he's Korean only on the outside and he talks and thinks like an American.

1. Yes
2. No
3. Yes
4. No

The script is illegible because it was written in pencil a long time ago.

0 Replies

Ascribbler is incorrect. Lordy's responses are correct.

0 Replies

Written by pencil...

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