actual *grader’s* notes

March 24, 2014 in joyce's milkmaid, Life Story

i’ve typeface-ized the “formula” stuff
but the point here is the english.
tonight i encountered the passage

Since there are (p-1)/2 quadratic residues & 1^2, 2^2, …, [(p-1)/2)]^2 are all the residues, we need to show that the quadratic residues modulo p are all distinct…

and, after much wailing and gnashing
of teeth, decided that the best spin
i could put on it would be
to *omit* the first “the*
and to replace the second “the”
with “these”:

Since there are (p-1)/2 quadratic residues & 1^2, 2^2, …, [(p-1)/2)]^2 are all residues, we need to show that these quadratic residues modulo p are all distinct…

(which “works” in its context
as the original passage certainly
does *not*).

they should give medals for this kind
of copyediting. this is *hard work*.
not that it does anyone any *good*,
mind you…

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