I came across this personal statement on the website of a mainland college prep agency that specializes in writing such documents on behalf of university applicants. Since the company displayed the piece to give prospective clients an idea of what they can offer, they must have thought of it as well-written. I found it severely lacking in style and voice, though. I’ve come up with a better version, one that is 20% lengthier but packed with much more personality and content
“Didn’t you know there’s a difference between ‘indicate’ and ‘point out’?” my tutor at Oxford University fired this question at me after noting I’d been using both words interchangeably. The class was supposed to be on philosophy, but back then, my sensitivity towards English was so wanting that my tutor would often opt to teach… Continue reading “An infinite capacity for taking pains”
文革時期，在北大教授哲學的宗白華，自然成為整頓對象。他被掃地出門，被命令去掃樹葉。那當時宗白華心里是怎麽想？跟他同樣遭難的北大教授馮友蘭文革後談到宗白華，說“那年夏天我和白華同在南閣‘學習’，有一次看見他身穿白褲褂，一手打傘，一手搖著紙扇，從北閣後面的山坡上走來，悠哉悠哉。我突然覺得這不就是一種‘晉人風度’嗎？"
“Since most writers are fools, especially about money, a new client was likely to find his dreams being set straight quite early (by Pat) in the relationship,” so began writer Clive James’ tribute to his literary agent Pat Kavanagh after she passed away. “Such bluntness could be daunting,” James went on to say ,“but it… Continue reading Right on the Money
在英國，有讀小學的孩子的香港家長，都不會對Eleven Plus 考試陌生（簡單來説，要入讀英國的頂尖公立中學和私校，就必須在11-12嵗期間,拿到優秀的Eleven Plus成績）。對在香港長大的學生來説，Eleven Plus 英文卷的困難程度，可以用以下幾張圖表達.
書法大師沈尹默(1883-1971)總是勸友人不要學他的字，”如果真要學，就找我的娘家去學”，沈的意思是，如果友人直接模仿他所景仰的書法家，他們得益將更多。沈的建議雖然有道理，但他一個學生卻認爲行不通： “老師，你的娘家家族可大呢，叫人一時如何學得了。”
When I began to write professionally several years ago, the type of writing I dreaded the most was the one that seemed the easiest at first glance: narrative writing. How tricky could narrative writing be, you might ask. After all, in our everyday conversations, we constantly recount happenings to others, and we do so effortlessly… Continue reading Navigating narrative writing
Ask any secondary school student to name the English assignment they hate the most, and they are most likely to say “the argumentative essay.” Indeed, the strain of having to fake interest in arguing for or against a topic is soul-sapping enough. The fact that this form of writing is difficult to master alienates students… Continue reading Writing aid for the argumentative essay
In the early 1980s, when the Chinese Communist Party permitted overseas Chinese to set foot in their homeland again, Cecilia Chiang made her way from the US to her native city of Beijing: in the intervening decades, while being abroad she had reinvented herself as a restauranter and leading proponent of Chinese cuisine; she was… Continue reading Two responses to a DSE English essay topic
A large part of writing well has to do with knowing what not to write. This is much harder than it sounds: students who lack good training tend to write whatever comes to mind. They tend to include even more irrelevant material when they are working under the time pressure of an exam: with adrenaline… Continue reading Go off-topic in a writing exam and lose marks
At one point in her operatic career, Maria Callas became so portly that in a performance where she sang next to live elephants on stage - they were there as props - a critic joked he couldn’t distinguish her legs from those of the gigantic beasts’. Stung by these harsh words, Callas announced - to… Continue reading Hitting the high notes
Come Write Like Michelle 