Correcting Claire

One of the most challenging things I’ve done here in Brighton is editing my friend Claire’s work, who speaks relatively little English. As a result, her written work is an unusual combination of words that just aren’t quite right and a touch of French grammar.

It’s difficult to edit this for a couple of reasons. The largest challenge is that in order to help her I have to do more than just discover the grammatical errors. I have to discover what it is that she meant to say, and then help restructure entire phrases and sentences without destroying her particular voice. This is an incredibly frustrating process.

The second problem is that she somehow manages to phrase things in ways that make my brain lock up. I’ll read a paragraph two or three times and think to myself, “Well, it’s not really wrong, but it’s also not right.” I know that what she’s said doesn’t really mean what she wants it to, but for some reason I’m unable to come up with the correct phrase. So I’m experiencing reader’s block, I guess.

Finally, I get thrown a bunch of French grammar. The most distinct tendency is the misuse of the word “the.” Admittedly, it tends to show up in seemingly random places in English, but we don’t use it for abstract things (as far as I know). I see a lot of this:

“…the English is very difficult…”
“…the coming into force of this law…”
“…the rule of the reasonable punishment…”

Which I can only assume is a result of the way whatever equivalent structure exists in French (which must be similar to Spanish). I probably don’t use “el” or “la” in Spanish as much as I should, since it usually seems wrong.

I wish I could give more examples because it’s all very fascinating in a frustrating sort of way, but I don’t want to poke fun at her writing, which is what it would look like. Considering the level of her English, she’s doing very well.