Compos? Read. That’s all i can say. sec school english lessons ain’t helping me much. in fact my command of english became worse after coming to RV. gosh.
I always rush through my exam essays so that i can sleep. pengs =X

Read newspapers everyday. I’ve been doing it since i was 10 yrs old. It really helps 😉

that was a great bit of prose… i couldn’t have articulated everrything as well as you. but now its up to you think of the ending…

Do YOU think there’s an ‘end’ to the story?
Perspective, isn’t it? To me, it has ended. To others, it hasn’t.
Not everything needs to be spelled out, I think? Do YOU think your English is atrocious? You don’t need others’ opinions to determine what you write, eat, are. I won’t dicuss your piece at length here. Perhaps you can re-edit your work and spot your own mistakes. See what you find.

I’m very curious about the switching between present and past tense. Prose is right though, I don’t think narrative compositions can be written in the present tense. Only Expository, Argumentative, Literary… I think.

From your prose piece I think your English is really good. I don’t think that you need to use words that have more than three syllables to be considered as “good” in English. Your prose spoke simply, and that indicates proficiency and intelligence on the part of the writer.

But if you really want to improve your English, I suggest you read books, columns and other English-oriented (the proper one, mind you) periodicals. =) Or learn a new word a day and use it in a sentence. =) Or read a classic (i.e. Jane Eyre, Secret Garden, Portrait Of A Young Man..) I hope I helped. =)

Wow, you can write stories?! That’s awesome! I’m not creative, so story-writing doesn’t go well with me. LOL. Sorry to hear that your English is getting worse, but like Marz said, your English is perfect to me! Yeah, you can read books to improve on your English, or take some free online courses or something like that…

Hmmm, this is a tough one. Language has never been my strength. But your main problem is ending off your stories right? Try reading more other people’s works?

heh my english is worse..i was born in canada but never lived there. i came back to canada just six years ago and my english still sucks 🙁 anyways too bad about your story not having an ending..i was really looking forward to it xD hopefully some inspiration will come and you can finish it 😉

your english atrocious? Oh come on, if its that bad, you wouldnt had used that word. 😉

I don’t care what anyone says, I think you’re a great writer nonetheless. 🙂

[…] What Per said in my previous entry’s comments made sense. When I wrote The Cat, that ending was my ending. Nothing more. […]

your use of the present tense works.
here are some tips to help you improve:
1. read voraciously. this will give you the needed exposure to different styles. read authors who are known for their good use of the language, not just for their plots. slow down your reading to soak in the language (it’s often tempting to go fast and skip over words when the plot thickens). it helps to read out loud, especially the very well-written passages, so the language use will form a deeper impression. read also some books on writing – the good ones will highlight stylistic issues for you to focus on. the best i’ve seen so far is ‘adios, strunk and white’. i’m gonna buy one copy for myself as soon as borders has stock.
2. write. like what you’re already doing. but try to write well, and edit your writings. even the best writers go through and edit their writings multiple times just to make sure everything sounds right.

hope this helps.