Letter to a Professor

[alexzive]

This is a letter I intend to send to a Professor. I have a lot of doubts about ii because It contains some points very difficult for me to be managed appropriately in "high english". I will immensely thank all of you helping me to correct it. Please don?t consider the content, but only grammar and syntax. I hope this will be useful for other people too

Alex

Dear Prof. XY,

Your book has arrived to me yesterday and despite the fact that until now I managed to enterely read only the first chapter, I would like to express a first positive impression for the completeness of the book that, I am sure, has been noticing (or will be noticed soon) at my Department in Milano.

I?ve especially appreciated your analysis of the situation of our sector today and related "specialized knowledge maintenance issue" and recruitment problem. I would like to voice my humble experience about it: as young engineer my point of view is focused on the future and I see with profound worry what you have appropriately defined as a "today very different Zeitgeist" in the developed world (pp.76).
Such worry in combination with others let me decide to wide my skills horizontally and to renounce to a career as pure Engineer or to a PhD in Engineering.

Regarding applying for the MPhil in Tecnology Policy by your Department, this prospect is firmly remained by me: I am processing the application in these days. I am still waiting for one recommendation letter and I am now concentrating on the english Proficiency test.

Hoping to keep in touch with you,

Best Regards from Italy

Alex Z.

[sls]

Hello, Alex. I am not a native speaker or an English teacher so you should probably not take my corrections into consideration. Nevertheless, I'll try to improve the first paragraph as an exercise of my English. (I would do the whole letter, but, unfortunately, I don't have the time.)

First of all, let's think about the style of your writing. I couldn't figure out whether you know the professor you are writing to or not. Perhaps he is/was your teacher, or you have met him and spoken with him - in this case, it would be OK to use a not-so-formal style. Otherwise, if you have never had written or spoken conversation with him, i.e. you don't know him and he doesn't know you, you would have to pick a formal style in order not to express familiarity and not to sound too crude. Anyway, as I am no expert in style (yet ), I'll constrain my corrections to grammar and sentence structure.

"Your book has arrived to me yesterday" - You can't use the present perfect tense when you define a moment in the past (yesterday). "To me" doesn't sound quite good there. I would phrase it "I received your book yesterday...". You could mention the book's title if there would be ambiguity otherwise.

"and despite the fact that until now I managed to enterely read only the first chapter" - here you have the opposite case - you don't have a certain point in the past where you did the reading of the first chapter. Consequently, you should use the perfect tense, as in: "...and despite the fact that I have only managed to read the first chapter entirely so far..." or maybe "...and despite the fact that, so far, I have only managed to read the first chapter entirely..."

"I would like to express a first positive impression for the completeness of the book" - This one sounds funny to me. At first I didn't know why, but then I found the reason - "to EXpress an IMpression". Anyway, that's not what is wrong about this part of the sentence. I would say something like "...I would like to share with you the positive impression I got from the book's completeness..."

"that, I am sure, has been noticing (or will be noticed soon) at my Department in Milano." - I am not quite sure what you mean with this, as there is a grammar mistake, but here is a suggestion for improvement - "...which, I am sure, many of my colleagues here at the Departament in Milano have noticed (or will notice soon)." Note that I've introduced a new idea (colleagues) which might not be what you wanted to epxress. If so, you should change it. I'm also not sure about the preposition 'at' before "Departament" and if the latter should be capitalized.

Finally, we get:
I received your book yesterday, and, despite the fact that I have only managed to read the first chapter entirely so far, I would like to share with you the positive impression I got from the book's completeness, which, I am sure, many of my colleagues here at the Departament in Milano have noticed (or will notice soon).

We have one looong sentence there, and it might be better to split it in two or three. In English, it's not bad style to use short sentences (at least according to my textbook). Not that it's wrong to use long ones, but in some cases the structure gets too complicated. The result I reached sounds understandable (to me) and you could leave it as it is.

That's about it. I hope I have been of assistance to you.

Stanislav.
_________________
"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction."
Albert Einstein

[Tamara]

Respect, Stanislav. Very impressive!

Can I ask you a 'that/which' question?

[sls]

[alexzive]

Dear Stanislav
thank you very much for you effort!
Unforntunatly I ?ll have no time until Friday to take part to the discussion I actually started..

TOEFL test is coming..

See you "later"

Alex

[Tamara]

Hi Stanislav

Thanks a lot for the detailed explanation.
_________________
It’s impossible to learn swimming without entering the water…