Thank You so much for got Your essays! I’m realy glad to get Your E-malis to improve my English.Aspecialy I would give my best thanks to Allan. Your English reminds me to a good penfriend in youth time fourty years ago. He gave me the will to learn English.
First time was realy hard to read and translate to got the point of his thoughts. I’ll never forget when in a stormy autumn evening
our home bell was ringing and a well dressed young man asked for me on door. My parents could’nt get an answer to him because they never learned English. So they called me and I was realy surprised first time in my life to speak English with a native English speaker. It was a need to speek English for me a good experience in my life! Thanks for your efforts ! God bless You and Your crew!
Best regards Dieter Radke
Hi Alan, Dieter and everybody,
Yesterday I got the second part of Alan’s essay and, as usual, found very useful new words and expression. Also I look through the dictionary and found out that the word ‘humbug’ is used as a verb in the meaning of ‘deceive’. There is a couple of ways of using this word which seems to me rather interesting: “to humbug into smth” and “to humbug out of smth”. Alan, may I use these expressions as in the following sentences: “They humbugged him into the jobbery.” or “He was humbugged out of his money.”?
As for Mr Scrooge, notorious for his worshipping money, in Russian literature there is another character who’s name became a symbol of greed and mediocrity. His name is Plushkin and he is a personage of the novel “Dead Souls”(Мёртвые души) by Nicolai Gogol.
Best regards,
Yuri
Hello Alan,
Great contribution to mine knowledge of Britain. In my native country almost all old building were demolished during world war two. I feel a little bit envy for missed possibility to find out the history of old constructions and at the time have ability point on them by your thumb ))).
Best regards
Siarhei
I don’t know where it comes from all this noise.(( On my local workstation everything sounds perfect.
I think the noise is because there was some background noise, maybe a fan, and the voice level was very low. When you listen on your desktop the noise sounds normal and you can ignore it. But when you compress it using Speex and then MP3 the noise and your voice become very strange sounding. To get a better recording, get rid of any noise in the room, and record your voice more loudly. You may have to turn up the microphone in your computer’s audio control panel.
Thank you Alan, i really enjoy with this essay!
Hello,
It was an interesting article. keep inspiring us with useful newsletter.
Many thanks,
Meera
Definitely Christmas is a great time, but I actually have not celebrated it for years. Per se I forgot this great holiday, but next time I’m going to renew tradition of celebrating this holiday.
THE STORY IS VERY EDUCATIVE AND VERY INTERESTING .
THANKS
ALAN
Alan,
I like Lytton’s quote " the pen is mighter than the sword". This is why Allah “God” swear by the pen in quraan as quoted below.
(By the pen and what the (angels) write (in the Records of men).
Regards
Yousef Nasser
hi there
the story of chistmass is always nice and beautifull,
It sounds nostalgic and i remembered my school nativity plays,
good old days,
thanks,cheers
Anahid
Dear Alan,
Thank you for the very nice essay about Christmas Carol. I must say that I like reading your essays. The language there is so alive.
Alan, I would like to ask you something. I am reading now Charles Dickens’s novel called Great Expectations. For my level of English, Dickens is not easy to read, but I am trying. The question I want to ask you is about the phrase used in this novel “to outrun the constable” which means to spend more money than you earn or fall into debts.
Could you please tell me whether this phrase is still used in today’s language? I asked this question an English teacher from Canada and she told me she never heard it. The point is the word constable is not used anymore in today’s everyday language. People use the “police officer” instead of that one.
So, is the phrase “to outrun the constable” still used in today’s language?
Thank you in advance,
Orest.
Dear Alan,
Could you be so kind to answer my question? Here are two sentences.
I am a writer living in Paris.
I am a writer, live in Paris.
Well, I know for sure that the first one is correct. What about the second? The sense of both of them is the same, but can I write the second one using coma with the same sense?
Thank you in advance!
Orest.
The second, with or without the comma, is grammatically incorrect. Alternatives to your first sentence might be:
“I am a writer, I live in Paris.”
“I am a writer who lives in Paris.”
Hi Alan
Your Essay Chirstmas is good. When you write essay, please use simple sentence
and phrase and make everyone to understand. Most of the places I couln’t unserstand
the meaning. Could you please tell me the meaning for “She was however as sane
as you and me”.The English is second language for me, so I find it difficult to understand.
Thanking you
S.Shanthi
A sane person is someone who can think and behave normally, reasonably and sensibly and is not mentally ill.
‘She’ (in Alan’s article) behaved in an unusual way, but she was usually as sensible as any other sane person.
Hi Shanthisethuraman,
Thanks for your comments. When I write material for the site, I always try to remember that some words and expressions might be difficult for some people. Whenever possible I try to explain in brackets ( ) what the word/expression means. But then if it was too easy, it wouldn’t be much fun, would it?
Back to your question about
What I meant was that usually, most of the time she used to behave in a normal way.
Alan
Dear Beesneese and Alan Sir,
I want thank both of you for the meaning which I asked you.
Alan sir,you always try to remember that some words and expressions
might be difficult for not some people but many people like me.
Sir you are always thinking about the people who are outstanding i.e.
upto your level and writing essays that I will never deny, at the same
time you should think of my level i.e. understanding capacity.
Without understanding the meaning How we can say I learnt everything
from your essay.Surely I cannot come to your level sir, but you can
make it simple and make everyone happy, that is what I want to tell you.
If there is any mistake in my letter, please excuse me.
Thank you
S.Shanthi
Hey Allan i love your stories and it helps me to improve on my grammar but i don’t know where your books are found
Hey Allan your stories are good.