Toward the end of his life, the Chevalier de Seingalt (1725-1798) wrote a long memoir recounting his life and adventures. The Chevalier was a somewhat controversial figure, but since he met many famous people, including kings and writers, his memoir has become a valuable historical source about European society in the eighteenth century. However, some critics have raised doubts about the accuracy of the memoir. They claim that the Chevalier distorted or invented many events in the memoir to make his life seem more exciting and glamorous than it really was.
For example, in his memoir the Chevalier claims that while living in Switzerland, he was very wealthy, and it is known that he spent a great deal of money there on parties and gambling. However, evidence has recently surfaced that the Chevalier borrowed considerable sums of money from a Swiss merchant. Critics thus argue that if the Chevalier had really been very rich, he would not have needed to borrow money.
Critics are also skeptical about the accuracy of the conversations that the Chevalier records in the memoir between himself and the famous writer Voltaire. No one doubts that the Chevalier and Voltaire met and conversed. However, critics complain that the memoir cannot possibly capture these conversations accurately, because it was written many years after the conversations occurred. Critics point out that it is impossible to remember exact phrases from extended conversations held many years earlier.
Critics have also questioned the memoir's account of the Chevalier's escape from a notorious prison in Venice, Italy. He claims to have escaped the Venetian prison by using a piece of metal to make a hole in the ceiling and climbing through the roof. Critics claim that while such a daring escape makes for enjoyable reading, it is more likely that the Chevaliers jailers were bribed to free him. They point out that the Chevalier had a number of politically well-connected friends in Venice who could have offered a bribe
The reading and lecture are both about a memoir by Chevalier de Seingalt who lived in the European society in the eighteenth century. The reading doubts the accuracy of the memoir, while the professor in the lecture contradicts all these explanations and proving that the memoir is a reliable historical source.
Firstly, the reading posits that Chevalier had borrowed money from the Swiss merchants even if he claimed that he was affluent. However, the professor rebuts this by saying that, he was wealthy, but he had to sell all his assets to change to liquid cash. He had borrowed them from the rich because he had to wait for the money to get to his hands after the sale.
Secondly, the reading points out that, the conversations between the Chevalier and Voltaire were captured soo accurately, which had made the critics ambiguous and they had researched that these discussions were done years after their meeting. The professor says one flaw of this argument is, there are confirmed reports that Chevalier regularly checked notes and journals for his memoir writing. She adds that there was clear evidence for the notes right after the conversation between them. Chevalier captured the precious moments with the famous writer and copied to the memoir.
Finally, the author of the reading suggests that the escape from the prison in Venice, Italy was added to impress the readers. Moreover, he had bribed the jailers to free him thereby proving that he had political support. In contrast, the professor in the lecture refutes the argument by stating that other prisoners were more powerful than Chevalier and they probably had more powerful political friends than him. Bribery was hard in that period in Venice. Additionally, the government had evidence of the ceiling repair where Chevalier was imprisoned.
From all the three plausible reasons the professor in the lecture corroborates that the memoir by the Chevalier is accurate.
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 10, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...o his hands after the sale. Secondly, the reading points out that, the convers...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, finally, first, firstly, however, if, moreover, second, secondly, so, while, in contrast
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 14.0 10.4613686534 134% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 0.0 5.04856512141 0% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 7.30242825607 110% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 12.0772626932 132% => OK
Pronoun: 36.0 22.412803532 161% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 38.0 30.3222958057 125% => OK
Nominalization: 6.0 5.01324503311 120% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1633.0 1373.03311258 119% => OK
No of words: 318.0 270.72406181 117% => OK
Chars per words: 5.13522012579 5.08290768461 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.22286093782 4.04702891845 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.56531505732 2.5805825403 99% => OK
Unique words: 165.0 145.348785872 114% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.518867924528 0.540411800872 96% => OK
syllable_count: 494.1 419.366225166 118% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.55342163355 103% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 3.25607064018 123% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.23620309051 121% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.51434878587 66% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 2.5761589404 78% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 15.0 13.0662251656 115% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 21.2450331126 99% => OK
Sentence length SD: 46.9886038193 49.2860985944 95% => OK
Chars per sentence: 108.866666667 110.228320801 99% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.2 21.698381199 98% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.2 7.06452816374 88% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.09492273731 122% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 4.19205298013 24% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 4.33554083885 161% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 4.45695364238 112% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.27373068433 70% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.210949091897 0.272083759551 78% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0802617222317 0.0996497079465 81% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0488779948414 0.0662205650399 74% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.121435668418 0.162205337803 75% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0297072919983 0.0443174109184 67% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.4 13.3589403974 100% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 50.16 53.8541721854 93% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 5.55761589404 56% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 11.0289183223 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.53 12.2367328918 102% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.75 8.42419426049 104% => OK
difficult_words: 82.0 63.6247240618 129% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 10.7273730684 98% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 10.498013245 99% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.2008830022 116% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.