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-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 18 hrs (2019-11-30 10:15:06 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Asker: Thanks for feedback. Still, I'm very interested if it is possible to make a sentence with a preposition. i.e. "lock the door on (or with?) the top and bottom locks"?
No, it's not done this way. To avoid having the text sound like it was originally written in another language, you'll need to get creative and play around with the text. Here's a starting point but you'll need take your particular context into account: "He locked up the room, making sure both the latch and deadbolt were securely in place this time."
Thank you very much, David. I will probably use lock the room up using both the top and bottom locks. But still I would prefer a variant with a preposition because it would better fit into the context. Is the "on" or "with" option absolutely impossible?
I'd probably say: "lock the door at the top and the bottom", unless there was an element of permanency, in which case I might say "lock the room up using both the top and bottom locks". I probably wouldn't use "upper" or "lower" and they would sound formal or pedantic, even though the locks might well be at one-third and two-thirds of the height!
Very interesting question, Alexander. We may often see such discussions in Kudoz. It seems to me that you want to use the word "room" in your translation. IMHO, it is correct, of course, it is clearer for native speakers. If we turn to the question, it says "закрыть комнату"? which should be rendered in the translation. I agree with correct usage (with door), but it would sound better if we include the room in our translation although it means the same thing. In Russian context, the room is highlighted. (may be - have the room locked, lock the room etc.) И это отличительная черта русского языка. What I mean is there should be difference between закрыть дверь и закрыть комнату?
Clearly you can say "lock a room" and be understood, but it would be unusual. I might say "lock the bathroom door" or "we lock this room up for the winter", "we lock the house up when we go on holiday", where "up" implies some degree of permanence or lack of use. So to indicate which room, I would add an adjective to "door". You can also "lock the safe", where a safe is seen as a box rather than a room. There is also the slightly strange usage "lock the door behind you" which means "don't forget to lock the house door when you go out", and doesn't mean performing contortions to lock a door behind your back!
Alexander, I dunno. Looking at those search results I see only non-native TripAdvisor comments and references to virtual 'rooms' (where there are no doors to speak of). The rest are, quite properly, phrases like "lock the room door". So don't get fooled by the number of search hits and trust David on this one. Although I prefer Katya's suggestion :-)
David, I'm not quite sure that you cannot lock a room in English. After all, you definitely can have "keys to a room" and a room can definitely be locked, not only closed, but locked too. Therefore, it logically follows that you can lock a room or have it locked. And Google search for "lock the room" gives quite a lot of matches
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 18 hrs (2019-11-30 10:15:06 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Asker: Thanks for feedback. Still, I'm very interested if it is possible to make a sentence with a preposition. i.e. "lock the door on (or with?) the top and bottom locks"?
No, it's not done this way. To avoid having the text sound like it was originally written in another language, you'll need to get creative and play around with the text. Here's a starting point but you'll need take your particular context into account: "He locked up the room, making sure both the latch and deadbolt were securely in place this time."
Example sentence(s):
Did you lock the top lock?
Damn, I forgot to lock the bottom lock!
Katya Kesten Local time: 09:04 Works in field Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 16
Grading comment
Thanks!
Notes to answerer
Asker: Thanks for feedback. Still, I'm very interested if it is possible to make a sentence with a preposition. i.e. "lock the door on (or with?) the top and bottom locks"?