Union of Translators of Russia

Saint Petersburg Branch

Юмор

EU News :)

The European  Union commissioners  have announced  that agreement  has been reached to adopt English  as the preferred language for  European communications, rather than German,  which was the other  possibility.
As  part  of  the  negotiations,  the British government conceded that
English spelling  had some  room for  improvement and  has accepted  a five-year phased plan for what will be known as EuroEnglish (Euro  for short).

In  the  first  year,  "s"  will  be  used  instead  of  the soft "c".
Sertainly, sivil servants will resieve this news with joy.  Also,  the
hard  "c"  will  be  replaced  with  "k".  Not only will this klear up
konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik  enthusiasm in the sekond year,  when the troublesome "ph" will  be replaced by  "f". This will  make words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter.

In  the  third  year,  publik  akseptanse  of  the new spelling kan be
expekted  to  reach  the  stage  where  more  komplikated  changes are possible. Governments  will enkorage  the removal  of double  letters, which have  always ben  a deterent  to akurate  speling. Also,  al wil agre  that  the  horible  mes  of  silent  "e"s  in  the  languag   is
disgrasful, and they would go.

By the fourth year, peopl wil  be reseptiv to steps such as  replasing
"th" by z" and "w" by " v".

During  ze  fifz  year,  ze  unesesary  "o"  kan  be  dropd from vords
kontaining "ou",   and similar changes  vud of kors  be aplid to  ozer
kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav  a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil  be
no mor trubls or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu  understand
ech ozer.

Ze drem vil finali kum tru.

How To Write Good

1. Avoid alliteration. Always.
2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
3. Avoid cliches like the plague. (They're old hat.)
4. Employ the vernacular.
5. Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
6. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.
7. It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
8. Contractions aren't necessary.
9. Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.
10. One should never generalize.
11. Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know."
12. Comparisons are as bad as cliches.
13. Don't be redundant; don't use more words than necessary; it's highly superfluous.
14. Be more or less specific.
15. Understatement is always best.
16. One-word sentences? Eliminate.
17. Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.
18. The passive voice is to be avoided.
19. Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.
20. Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
21. Who needs rhetorical questions?
22. Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.