ON LETTER WRITING:1
I (The
creator of this post) was sent to a hostel, only fifty kilometers away from my
home, in 1996, only 22 years ago, we are from India, I was the only kid of my
family, and my grandfather had a heart attack only after 15 days I was shifted
in a hostel, because he was bereaved without seeing me and the only telephone
system in the village was not under function. We had a telephone given by the
government authority, installed in the ablest family of the village. My
grandfather made his address in that family hoping to get a call from me or my
hostel and his expectation led him to hospital. I came back home. My grand pa also came back. He taught me how
they used to write letter everyday when there was no telephone in the village.
He gave me a bag of postcards, in a post card there is an ADDRESS portion which
my grand Pa filled with his name and address, he told me as soon as I reach my
hostel back, I should write at least one post card every day, and submit them
to the DAKIYA (Postman) who came every afternoon to our hostel.
I did as
per his instructions, and an astonishing thing started with me; that was the
DAKIYA also started giving me letter from my grand pa. That was a
communication, at the end of 20th century. And we are in the
beginning of the 21`st century, today we have emails, Facebook, mobiles, text massages,
what’s app, and everything. When people travel by an airplane for the first
time, they express their experience by a status on any platform of social
media, and we all know it. Today I live 1300 kilometer away from my home, and I
video call to them every day but my grand pa is no more, that is the saddest thing in my life.
LETTERS
There was
a time when a letter used to be news in our village. Today when I see people
video calling people living in a place miles away, I think if my grandfather
was alive, how happy he would have been seeing me on a video call, and how
happy I would be to call him!!! But the Almighty God gave us a time together
when letter was the only communication.
Letters
are of two types, 1. Formal & 2.
Informal. Informal letters deal in the
letters between two friends, two relatives, parent and child, birthday cards
etc. These types of letters are still alive on our examination answer
sheets. Formal letters also exist on
the examination answer sheets and they are still alive everywhere from writing
a letter to the editor of a news paper to the application for the renewal of
your driving license or voter card. In this chapter today we are going to
broadly discuss about all these things.
Letter
Writing
Every
educated man and woman should know how to write a letter that is clear on the
topic the letter is. Every one often needs to communicate with those bodies
existing before our existence that run through written communication. This
written communication is letter. The art of letter writing is not merely an
ornamental -accomplishment, it is rather a need of man’s life every day.
The forms of
letters..
Letters
are classified into two categories; 1. Informal or friendly letters & 2.
Formal or business letters. Each of them has its own particular form. In these
forms a few points are common; these points are being listed below.
a. The
heading that consists i. the writer’s address and ii. Date of
writing the letter.
b.
The
courteous greeting or salutation.
c.
The body of the letter.
d.
The subscription or courteous
leave making.
e.
The signature.
f.
The subscription on the envelope.
THE HEADING
The heading informs the readers where the letter was
written from and when, where portion gives the writer’s full postal address.
However if the letter is written on a letter head on which the sender’s address
details are already furnish, then there is no need to give the address again.
The position of heading is the top right corner of the
first page of the letter. The address above and the date just below the
address. However in modern letters, there is a growing tendency of writing the
heading at the top left corner, and there is nothing wrong in it. Many School
Boards, like CBSE in India prescribes to write the heading on the top left
corner of the first page of the letter.
For
example..
122B Rasbihari Avenue
Gorabajar, Kolkata 07
12.12.2018
|
SALUTATION OR GREETING
Salutation or greeting depends upon the relation between
the sender and receiver of the letter. To a family member or a friend a
suitable salutation is ‘Dear father’, ‘My dear mummy’, ‘Dear Peter’ etc. To a
business people like the editor of a news paper, officer in an office etc a
suitable salutation is “Dear Sir’ or Dear madam’. However there is a growing
tendency of using only ‘Sir’ or ‘Madam’ without ‘Dear’ before it.
The position of the salutation is at the left hand at a
lower level than the Heading.
122B Rasbihari Avenue
Gorabajar, Kolkata 07
12.12.2018
My dear mummy,
|
BODY OF THE LETTER
The communication or body of the letter is of course the
letter itself, and style in which it is written will depend upon the kind of
the letter being written. The style of the letter written to an intimate friend
will be very different from that of business letter or an official
communication.
There are few things that apply all letters are listed
below.
a.
Divide your
letter (If it is not very short) into paragraphs, to mark changes of subject
matter, etc.
b.
Use simple and
direct language and short sentences. Don’t be eloquent and don’t drag in long
words, phrases or clauses. Be clear on what you want to communicate, and
communicate it as directly as possible.
c.
Be complete. It
is not good to add postscripts at the end of a letter. Before you start writing
the letter, take a minute to deeply think why you are writing and what you are writing
and then write in a logical order.
d.
Write neatly,
must not forget that your correspondent has to read what you write, and you
should not give him unnecessary trouble with bad penmanship.
e.
Mind your
punctuation, and put in commas and semicolons and full stops in their proper
places. Incorrect punctuation may mess up the meaning of the letter.
The subscription or the courteous leave taking
A letter
must not end abruptly, there should be a polite leave taking, such as yours
sincerely, yours faithfully etc. In traditional method, leave taking phrase is
written below the last word of the letter, towards the right side of the
letter. But there is a growing tendency to place the leave taking on the left
side. Must note that the first word o a leave taking phrase must begin with a
capital letter.
THE SIGNATURE OR NAME OF THE WRITER
This must
come below the subscription or leave taking phrase. Thus:
Yours sincerely
A K Singh
In letters
to strangers, the signature should be clearly written, so that the reader may
know whom to address in reply.
A woman
should prefix to the name Miss or Mrs. In side a bracket. Ms can be used by a
woman who doesn’t wish to be called as Miss or Mrs.
Such as
in
Yours faithfully
(Mrs.) Jyoty
Mukherjee
THE ADDRESS
ON THE ENVELOPE
The address on the envelope should be written
clearly, like this.
To
The Editor
Hindustan Times
22B Ratu road
Ranchi 56
|
In brief,
to write a letter, first write your address and under it the date in the top
right hand cornerof the first page. You may alternatively write them on the
left.
Then
write the salutation lower down at the left side of the page, beginning with a
capitaland putting a comma after it.
Next
begin your letter with a capital letter on the next lower line, to the write of
the salutation.
At the
end of the letter write the subscription, or words of leave taking at
right/left side of the page, with your signature below it.
Please visit our next post ON Letter writing that we are going to post
very soon. Please visit our website www.englishgrammartoday.com
for regular English grammar updates. Have a good day.
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