Take up?

[ali-karabulut]

Hello friends,

This is my first post to this forum, so I'd better inroduce myself first. Shortly, I am Ali from Turkey, a quadriplegic suffering from spinal cord injury; you might read about me here: http://alikarabulut.googlepages.com/

I have a question.

The business began to ...... and started to make profit.

With what do you think we might fill in the blank? Is 'take up' ok in place of 'pick up' or 'look up'?

[batmura]

The best answer would be pick up, meaning getting better. "take up" has a totally different meaning. Here's an example:

These books take up too much space in my library.

Look up as a phrasal verb means "to respect".

I look up to my parents. (I respect them.)

[ali-karabulut]

Hello batmura,

Take up has other meanings as well. Here, I tend to take the verb 'take up' metaphorically; that's why I come up with 'take up'. I am not sure, though whether or not we could use it in a figurative way. For example...

- The cloth takes up (or take in) the liquid.
- The sponge absorbs water well.

So...

- The business began to take up and started to make profit.

Take up customers (figuratively)

In Turkish 'müşteri çekmek'.

It seems you used 'look up' as 'admire', it must be 'admire'; on the other hand, 'look up' also means 'improve', 'get better', 'take a turn for the better'.

So,"The business began to look up and started to make profit" is correct. But we discuss 'take up' here.

I need other friends' comments, please. Better, the native ones.

Regards...

[batmura]

Take up customers (figuratively)

Hello!

I'm not a native speaker but I do not think "take up" could be used in such a context.

Let's see what native speakers have to say. :)

[Ouisch]

"Take up" doesn't work in the context of your sentence, although you could say "the business began to take off." "Pick up" would be the best choice; "look up" also fits.

[LadyOfTheValley]

Ali, I tried to email you at the address that is on your site. But the email was returned and it said the address did not exist.

Naomi

[Tdol]

Alikarabulut, welcome to the forum. I believe that this question came up in an exam in Turkey; one of our Turkish memebers asked about it:
http://www.usingenglish.com/forum/as...7-take-up.html
I agree with Ouisch that pick up/look up are the natural choices. In the other discussion on the question, one poster suggested that they could have meant 'take off', which would fit.

With 'look up', I think I might phrase it differently:
Things began to look up and the business started to make a profit.

There is a possibility of using take-up as a noun, meaning more people took them up on their offers or services, but that wouldn't fit the space in the example.

Of the choices, I would put 'pick up' first, then 'look up' and without changing the sentence around, would say that 'take up' doesn't work.