Editing Exercises


1		*Rewrite the following paragraph to correct problems with adjectives and adverbs. Also, eliminate problems with participles, adjectives made from verbs.* A vegetable fiber derived from the flax plant has given us linen, perhaps the oldest known textile. Its use goes way back at least to the Stone Age. Archaeologists have found whole bunches of linen cloth in digs of Neolithic sites where the Lake Dwellers of Switzerland once hung out. In the Nile Valley of Egypt, evidence of linen weaving dates back more than 6,000 years; the bodies of the Egyptian kings were wrapped in linen cloth (it's a crying shame that we still don't know all the secrets of Egyptian mummification). A surefire way to produce good flax is to grow it in swampy, mild lowlands. In recent times, France, Holland, and Germany have produced picture-perfect quality linen. Over the past century, fabrics superior than linen in durability and ease of care have replaced it as the cloth of choice; however, make no mistake—until well into the 18th century, linen was top dog in the textile world.



2		*Rewrite the following paragraph to correct problems with adjectives and adverbs. Also, eliminate problems with participles, adjectives made from verbs.* The kinds table manners we normally use in an expensive restaurant, in a diner, or even at home are hardly like those people used to use in the past. In fact, those we might see were we able to travel back in time and attend a meal served in the Middle Ages are very different from today. In the olden days, people didn't use a spoon to eat their soup; they simply chugged it down directly from a large bowl. Meats and vegetables weren't served daintily with each person getting his or her own portion. Instead, people dug in with their hands and scooped portions of grub from a common bowl that got passed one person to another. If you were hungrier then the next guy, you had to stick your hand first. Forks did not come on to the scene until the 16th century. The knowledge that disease-causing germs could be spread from one person to the other wasn't fully excepted until the 19th century. Thus it is safe to say that medieval dinners didn't no beans about bacteriology and the communicability of diseases. So no one made a big deal of washing before chowing down. Drinking cups for each diner were as rare as hens' teeth, and people often drank from a common vessel, passing it during the coarse of the meal. When people finished up, it stands to reason that they did not wipe their mouths with napkins; instead, they used their sleeves or the tablecloth, and some (this might sound really gross) even blew their noses into a common cloth.



3		*Rewrite the following paragraph to correct problems with adjectives and adverbs. Also, eliminate problems with participles, adjectives made from verbs.* The ancient Chinese figured the universe was composed of two complimentary but opposing forces: ying and yang. Ying is the female essence, yang the male. Yang is warmer, more assertive, and more dominant as his counterpart; ying is passive, cool, and dark. Ying springs of Mother Earth; another words, it represents fertility. Yang is associated to the heavens. Its' an analogy that also applies with the sun and the moon. Irregardless of all other factors, balance is created only when ying and yang are joined. Thus the sun (yang) and moon (ying) act inconjunction with another to create day and night. A similar balance occurs among male and female when the two join to create offspring.



4		*Rewrite the following paragraph to correct problems with adjectives and adverbs. Also, eliminate problems with participles, adjectives made from verbs.* On October 2, 1962, James Meredith passed the acid test that is a prerequisite to becoming a hero. He enrolled in the then all-white University of Mississippi. A Korean War veteran, Meredith was eligible for the educational benefits guaranteed him by the GI bill; he would have had no problem using them at any all-black college. But Meredith was determined to exercise his right to study at the school of his choice:black or white. Risking life and limb, he had to be escorted by U.S. marshals as he defied the white supremacist establishment and registered for classes. In 1962, Mississippi enforced a policy of racial segregation as vehemently as any southern state. Therefore, what James Meredith accomplished resounded throughout the region and the nation. Today, because of Meredith and many civil rights activists, the racial climate in American college campuses is greatly improved.



5		*Rewrite the following paragraph to correct problems with adjectives and adverbs. Also, eliminate problems with participles, adjectives made from verbs.* Ellis Island was opened in 1892 to process the ever-growing stream of immigrants fleeing Europe. At its height in the years before the First World War, Ellis Island became the gateway to America for the European immigrant. Almost without exception, if he had crossed the Atlantic, he would have to pass through Ellis Island's immigration center before beginning his life in a new world. For nearly 20 years around the turn of the century, more than a million immigrants per year were processed through Ellis Island. In fact, historians estimate that 40 percent of all Americans can trace their families back to an ancestor who arrived on this small island in New York harbor in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty. Typically, he would have arrived with his family, but in many cases he arrived alone, working here for several years and then calling for the rest of the family after he had saved enough money for their passage. The first Americans the immigrant met were, in most cases, immigration officers, who, dressed like policemen, often seemed intimidating to the newcomer. These men checked his papers to make sure that he had no criminal record and his emigration from his home country had been legitimate. Finally, he was examined by a member of the health service. Such a man held tremendous power, for if he found that the newcomer suffered from even the slightest ailment, he could order that he be quarantined for an indefinite period or, worse, that he be shipped back. After 1924 the flood of immigrants decreased, and the facilities were closed and abandoned in 1954. Recently, however, Ellis Island was renovated and turned into a national park. Today, a ferry takes the sons and grandsons of immigrants across the harbor to visit the splendid exhibits that reveal the terrible life that millions of immigrants had to endure in order to become Americans. Indeed, anyone who visits can stroll along a massive stone wall that lists millions of immigrant names and, most likely, find one that matches his own. Thus, Ellis Island again meets floods of people arriving by boat each year. It is one of the most visited parks in the nation.

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