新托福考试写作用词地道之写作原则
一.“言简朴实原则”
“言简朴实原则”意思是行文主张不写噜苏或绚丽的字眼(flowery or wordy),句子应该越短越好,一句能用两个字,绝不多加一个。例如:
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At this point in time, we should pull together for our goal. (现在我们应该为我们的目标团结一致)这句话中“At this point in time”表示“现在”,我们完全可以用now来代替。
Despite the fact that my English is not very good, I am not discouraged.(虽然我的 英语 (论坛) 不好,但我不灰心。) 这句话中despite the fact tha t= although = though,因此我们完全可以改成Although my English is not very good, I am not discouraged.
In the majority of cases, he likes to ride bike to the office. (他通常喜欢骑单车到办公室)。很简单的一句话,完全可以写成 He usually likes to ride bike to the office.
平时我们所说的用词多样化和地道并不是体现在这些时间副词或者是完全可以简化的啰嗦句型上,而是指实用性极强的词如动词和形容词,比如:
Original: Solving trivial problems in the dorm will add your social experience and help you to understand other people’s feelings and learn to be kind.
Revised: Solving trivial problems in the dorm will enrich your social experience and help you to understand other people’s feelings and learn to be considerate.
add,kind表达的含义都比较宽泛。add可以指数量上的增加,也可以指程度的加强,对于“丰富经验、增加知识”这个意思,用enrich 会使表达更准确。kind从字面意义上讲是“好的、善良的”,用kind来形容人无法具体地表现出一个人的性格特征到底怎样,原句中是想表达“考虑周到、体贴入微”的特点,要准确表达这个含义应选择considerate。
另外,我们常见的一些累赘用词表现在句意的理解上,比如:
He has had many years of (actual) experience in business. (他有多年经商的经验) actual是多余的,因为experience已经有actual的意味了。
We assembled (together) all the parts for our radio. (我们装好收音机的零件)assemble本身就有together的意思,因此together是多余的。
此外还有,in reference to=about; draw to close=end; at an early date=soon等。
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