2

I need to add a sentence to a letter that has already been translated into German, to say that the recipient of the letter can send his/her evaluation (opinion) either by email or on our website.

My question is whether the verbs in my tentative translation below are the most idiomatic:

Sie können mir Ihre Meinung per Email zusenden oder sie hier mitteilen: [LINK]

10
  • 1
    Looks good. Just make sure "Meinung" is the word you want to use.
    – user6191
    Commented Jul 22, 2014 at 18:54
  • An opinion based evaluation would be Bewertung/Beurteilung, whereas an objective evaluation would be Auswertung. Could you add the word in your native language?
    – user6191
    Commented Jul 22, 2014 at 19:02
  • @Carlster - thanks. This particular letter asks for a quick opinion (necessarily subjective) on a paper submitted to a journal. The previous paragraph says "... wäre ich Ihnen sehr dankbar, wenn Sie mir kurz Ihre Meinung über das Manuskript mitteilen können." Unless you think Meinung is inappropriate, I'll stick with it. Commented Jul 22, 2014 at 19:06
  • In this case, Meinung is just fine.
    – user6191
    Commented Jul 22, 2014 at 19:09
  • 2
    I don't think this question is appropriate for this site. Our partner site ELL has the "we're not a proofreading-service" close-vote, which I'm missing on this site. You should ask that kind of questions in chat (though you haven't enough rep yet). Alternatively, you can address a single issue which causes you trouble. As it stands now, it's way too unspecific. E.g. I can't see what part of the sentence you might be unsure about. Word-choice? Sentence structure? Grammaticality? Just to give you some ideas. I'm going to vote for close anyway.
    – Em1
    Commented Jul 22, 2014 at 20:00

1 Answer 1

3

Zusenden is composed of the prefix zu, in the sense of to(direction), and the verb senden, which means to send. So, the compound conveys the idea of "to send something to someone".
An Email is obviously an object that you can send (to someone); thus, it fits in context quite well. Another word you could take is zuschicken. There's no difference at all1.

Mitteilen is a compound of the prefix mit and the verb teilen(to share). The compound communicates that you "share information with someone". Possible translations: to tell, to inform.
An opinion is clearly something you can tell someone; hence, works well again. Another word you could take is sagen(to say, e.g. "Sagen Sie uns Ihre Meinung"), but in your sentence I'd go with mitteilen for sure (sounds a bit more formally and more politely).

Summary: Your sentence is perfectly well.


1 Note that senden and schicken (without the prefix) are much broader in meaning and are only synonymous in the sense of to send.

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.