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Difficultés anglaises

> letter-writing This has become something of a dying art in view of the widespread use of the telephone. However, all of us from time to time have to write some form of letter and many of these are business letters. There are a few conventions in formal letters that should be observed.• One's own address, including one's postcode, should be placed at the right-hand side of the page. Each line of one's own address should be indented slightly below the one above and the date put below the last line of the address, as in:• 23 Park Drive • Raleigh• Blackshire• RA14 2TY• 5 June 1993 • Whether one puts a comma at the end of the various lines of the address is a matter of taste. It is becoming common in modern usage not to do so. Note that there should be no full stop after the postcode.• One's telephone number can either be placed between the postcode and the date or at the other side of the page on the same line as the first line of the address.• If one is writing a business letter one should also put the address of the person to whom one is writing. It should be placed at the other side of the page below one's own address and the lines of this should be placed directly below each other without being indented, as in:• 23, Park Drive • Raleigh• Blackshire• RA 14 2TY• 5 June 1993 • The Manager Eastlands Bank • 33 West Street • Northlands• Blackshire• NR15 3RJ• With regard to deciding how to address the person to whom one is writing it is best to find out his/her name. Having done so then one can start the letter off, as in:• Dear Mr White,• If one is writing to a woman the situation is slightly more problematic. Formerly it was considered acceptable to address the person written to as "Miss" if one knew her to be unmarried or as "Mrs" if one knew her to be married. If one did not know her marital status one could either use "Miss" or use the "Madam" convention. In modern usage "Ms" is the acceptable term if one does not know the marital status of the woman to whom one is writing. Many people prefer to use this designation even if they do know the person's marital status and many women prefer to be addressed in this way. On the other hand, some women, especially older women, do not like the "Ms" designation.• In modern usage some people prefer to put the first name and surname of the relevant person instead of the surname preceded by Mr, etc, as in:• Dear John White,• The above style of address is considered rather informal by some people.• If it is not easy to ascertain the name of the person to whom one wishes to write then it is perfectly acceptable to address him/her in terms of their position or job, as in:• Dear manager,• Dear Personnel Manager,• Dear Area Manager,• In formal letters it is also acceptable to use "Sir" or "Madam", as in:• Dear Sir,• Dear Madam,• Dear Sir/Madam,• Obviously the above style of address is used in cases where one does not know the sex of the person to whom one is writing.• In ending a formal letter it was traditionally the custom to write "Yours" faithfully" before one's signature, if one had addressed the person written to as "Dear sir" or "Dear madam", as in:• Yours faithfully,• Jane Black • It was also the custom to end the letter with "Yours sincerely" if the letter was either informal in nature or a formal letter which began with "Dear Mr White" etc, as in:• Yours sincerely,• Mary Brown • In modern usage it is now considered acceptable to end a letter with "Yours" sincerely" even if one has begun it with "Dear sir", etc. These days "Yours" faithfully" is considered to be exceptionally formal.• It is common to end even business letters with "Kind regards", especially if the person written to is known to one.• On the envelope the lines can be indented or not, according to taste. Each line, except the last one, can have a comma after or not. However, in modern usage there is an increasing tendency to punctuate as little as possible and the commas are frequently omitted, as in:• Ms Mary Brown • 29 Lower Forth Street • Redwood• Blackshire• RD16 5YP• The same comments on Mrs, Miss and Ms apply to envelopes as apply to the opening greeting in letters. See above. Anything that can be done to make the address as clear as possible should be done. It is important always to put the postcode in the address as failure to do so slows down delivery of the letter. It is also advisable to highlight the town one is sending the letter to, either by putting it in capital letters, or by underlining it, as in:• Mr James Green • 45 Park Avenue • BOSTON• Blackshire• BT16 6GH• In modern usage it is becoming increasingly common to write the full name of the person written to on the envelope, as in:• James Black • 36 High Street • BLANKTON• Blankshire• BL13 9T2• It is considered formal or old-fashioned to use "Esq.", usually spelt with a full stop at the end and preceded by a comma. If used, "Esq." should be placed after the mans's name and there should be no accopmanying "Mr", as in:• John Brown, Esq• 43 Queen Street • Whiteoaks• Blankshire• WH12 TY Pour éviter fautes de grammaire, contresens et confusions. The English Usage Dictionary est le parfait complément des dictionnaires bilingues, du dictionnaire de définitions anglaises et du Thesaurus. Ce dictionnaire signale toutes les difficultés que recèle l'usage d'un mot: orthographe, grammaire, prononciation, homonymies, etc. Exemple d'article du dictionnaire English Usage Dictionary