7
Ancient Health Secrets
(2010)
by Kacper M. Postawski
review
Atrociously Mis-Spelled, Ultra-Low-Brow Booklet with Some
Useful But Over-Zealous Advice
Well, what can you say... encountering an illiterate booklet like
this can only inspire a compassionate smile on the reader's face;
apparently, in the 21st century, thanks to the Internet, anyone can
publish anything – without even mastering the elementary grammar
and spelling rules of the language in which they choose to publish
their writings. This booklet – overzealous in advocating
alternative approaches to health and nutrition issues – appears to
be some sort of illiterate transcript of a video recording, perhaps
– but that is no excuse. The same formal deficiencies were there in
an earlier volume by Postawski, Powerful Sleep; unfortunately,
defective grammar and spelling seems be a permanent trait of his
writings. In one of his e-mail newsletters, too, Postawski spells
"recuperate" as "re-cooperate"... Now that is hilarious.
Again, there is sloppy spelling in this volume right from the very
start, where it says: "Lets begin!" But how can you be selling this
"program" (pretentious name right there again...) for dozens of
dollars, while disregarding accepted spelling in that manner,
habitually omitting apostrophes? (Or inserting them where they don't
belong!) There are unbearable, inexcusable, innumerable misspellings
of "it's" as "its", as well as "its" as "it's" throughout the text.
There is ludicrous, or rather outrageous, seemingly purposeful
ignorance of proper spelling – in an educational book, though?!
There is habitual leaving out of apostrophes, and not even a
semblance of proper English punctuation (such as the endlessly
repeated, inane insertion of commas in between the noun and the
verb). There are also routinely missing periods at ends of sentences
or paragraphs.
Is this some sort of a secret strategy by the writer? It must be
feared that it is more likely the writer's being lackadaisical,
careless, or (if one wishes to use harsher terms) inept and
insufficiently educated. Take a look at this sample from the very
first text page of the PDF file:
<< This one thought [...] has lead [sic] my
family and I [sic] to a life of incredible health. >>
That is some atrocious spelling, syntax and/or grammar... and those
introductory 2 pages end with an enthusiastic "Lets Begin!", minus
the requisite apostrophe. This just strikes the reader as
uneducated, which may not be the ideal impression a text might
wish to create whose primary role, after all, is to educate the
reader... If a writer can't even master basic grammar and spelling
– is it likely that the writer's comprehension of health and
nutrition issues will be any more trustworthy?
On page 7, it says "foot" instead of "food"... I rest my case. How
can anyone be selling a text that has totally not been proofread?!
A book on food that misspells "dessert" as "desert"?! Come on...
The text reads like an extremely rough transcript made by someone
who failed all spelling, let alone punctuation and writing, classes
at primary or junior high school.
Now, all those formalities set aside, Postawski does offer some good
insight in this booklet; although it is often marred by radicalism.
However, it's impossible to enjoy reading this booklet, due to the
atrocious misspellings and grammar likely to be inflicting constant
pain on the reader's brain. Also, it is indefensible to be offering,
in 2010s, an e-text only in an old-fashioned, 1990s-style PDF file
– instead of (also or only) in the contemporary, user-friendly
e-book format such as EPUB or MOBI.
Rating: E+ (on a scale of A+ to F-)