Allow me to rant
7 Jun 2008 08:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wayfaringwordhackEven though it isn't my intention to rile anyone up, I know that what I have to say is probably going to raise some hackles. Nonetheless, I just can't help myself this time. Today, I was poking around the OWW and read a crit in which the reviewer took the author to task by saying, "I don't know that word.¹ You should change it."
Um, excuse me. What? Why are you trying to hold the author accountable for your vocabulary? And since when are writers allergic to learning new words? Aren't words the basic building blocks of your trade? When you come across a new one, shouldn't you be tickled? Shouldn't you try² to add it to your own cache, to be pulled out on that day when you need not the right word, but the just-right-and-it-can't-get-any-more-perfect word? What is it that writers have against using a dictionary?
With hundreds of thousands of words and loanwords in the English language, it's very unlikely that you are going to know them all. That's OK, though. Your friendly desktop dictionary or online equivalent is there to help you out.
Stop treating new-to-you words like the enemy and those who use them like show-offs. Coming across such words should be like stumbling on a gold mine, only there's no one there to fight you for the claim. Words are free game for whoever wants to use them. Use more and be happy! Don't begrudge those who choose to flash their bling³ from time to time.
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1) And it was not one of those infamous five/ten dollar words. But even if it was, why assume that the writer's currency value is your own? One person's $100 bill may be someone else's chump change.
2) I say "try" because I don't think every word is a fit for me. No matter how I try to recall or use certain words, some of them just never feel right or come naturally to me. I assume other people are the same. However, the word may not be right for you, but it might be perfect for one of your characters. Just another reason not to disdain your new finds.
3) That's me using a word that is *not* part of my everyday vocab, and I pray to heaven that it doesn't become one. May the parlance of these times pass quickly into oblivion, replaced by words that sound less like baby talk and onomatopoeias for cash registers and gadgets! I'm only kidding, of course...kind of.
Um, excuse me. What? Why are you trying to hold the author accountable for your vocabulary? And since when are writers allergic to learning new words? Aren't words the basic building blocks of your trade? When you come across a new one, shouldn't you be tickled? Shouldn't you try² to add it to your own cache, to be pulled out on that day when you need not the right word, but the just-right-and-it-can't-get-any-more-perfect word? What is it that writers have against using a dictionary?
With hundreds of thousands of words and loanwords in the English language, it's very unlikely that you are going to know them all. That's OK, though. Your friendly desktop dictionary or online equivalent is there to help you out.
Stop treating new-to-you words like the enemy and those who use them like show-offs. Coming across such words should be like stumbling on a gold mine, only there's no one there to fight you for the claim. Words are free game for whoever wants to use them. Use more and be happy! Don't begrudge those who choose to flash their bling³ from time to time.
___________________________________________
1) And it was not one of those infamous five/ten dollar words. But even if it was, why assume that the writer's currency value is your own? One person's $100 bill may be someone else's chump change.
2) I say "try" because I don't think every word is a fit for me. No matter how I try to recall or use certain words, some of them just never feel right or come naturally to me. I assume other people are the same. However, the word may not be right for you, but it might be perfect for one of your characters. Just another reason not to disdain your new finds.
3) That's me using a word that is *not* part of my everyday vocab, and I pray to heaven that it doesn't become one. May the parlance of these times pass quickly into oblivion, replaced by words that sound less like baby talk and onomatopoeias for cash registers and gadgets! I'm only kidding, of course...kind of.
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no subject
Date: 7 Jun 2008 11:51 am (UTC)I sometimes criticise the use of words that don't seem to fit, are used incorrectly, or that sound 'A-levelish' (the writer's throwing in an impressive-sounding word that probably says what they want, but in an incongruous fashion) but to say "Don't use that word - I don't know it" is ridiculous.
Talk about dumbing down. Grrr.
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 07:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 Jun 2008 04:37 pm (UTC)I have the opening chapters of the last novel up there now, but I don't know if I'm going to post any more of the book or not. The amount of work vs the value of the crits I'm getting is iffy at best. And the shock people express at the level of return crit I'm giving them is rather astonishing. I keep hearing 'Wow. You're totally right, but no one's pointed any of this out before.'
I've talked about this with my professional, published novelist friends. There seems to be an attempt by some critters to dumb everything on the shop down, to bring it all down to a culture that revolves around a lowest common denominator.
Experienced writers with a bit of confidence ignore this. Newer writers take it to heart. It can take a while to undo that damage.
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 06:56 am (UTC)Since I haven't used my membership in almost 2 yrs, I decided to wade back in. I just can't seem find anything in the unreviewed ranks that appeals to me (meaning something--specifically fantasy--just starting rather than things that are around the halfway mark). However, when I see crits like that, I just want to sigh and slink away again.
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 09:33 pm (UTC)So I suppose the only thing to do is to raise it right back up, no? :)
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 10:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 9 Jun 2008 07:33 am (UTC)Attitude is something I've decided to work on of late, and your comment brings home just how much of one's outlook and approach is affected when negativity gets a toehold.
no subject
Date: 9 Jun 2008 05:45 pm (UTC)Hide it under a bushel, NO! I'm gonna let it shine...
Date: 9 Jun 2008 05:56 pm (UTC)I don't care if my grumpiness is just a phase--a weather thing, a hormonal thing, a sickness thing--I'm tired of succumbing to it.
My light may be little, but I'm gonna make it shine.
Re: Hide it under a bushel, NO! I'm gonna let it shine...
Date: 9 Jun 2008 06:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 Jun 2008 06:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 07:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 Jun 2008 07:48 pm (UTC)However, I do think that while slinging in obscure/gentrified words can do wonders for a writer's sense of self-expression, it can also make that writer come off as pompous, unapproachable, or grandiose if not done right. And some very humble words can have incredible resonace, an expedient way of bringing in worlds of associations with half the amount of description. It's a fine line to walk and only the writer can decide which path is their own.
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 08:52 am (UTC)...let them eat dictionaries!
Hear, hear! :P
It's a fine line to walk and only the writer can decide which path is their own.
Yes, and it is important to have critters with good taste and keen sensibilities to point out other viewpoints/reactions that we as authors might miss.
I believe what bothers me the most (and I'm *not* saying you were doing/implying it at all!) is the judgment of "if not done right." Sometimes "right" is easy to see (word misuse, frex, or a drastic shift in tone), but when it comes to personal opinion, like those times when a reader *assumes* the writer is being pompous or what-have-you when said word is part of the writer's everyday vocabulary (something the reader can't know)? All the sudden it becomes a judgment on the author and not the fiction.
Sidetrack: Why do we jump on the defensive or feel the need to attack when faced with our own ignorance? (Here, I'm using "ignorance" defined as "lack of knowledge/awareness" rather than the synonym for stupidity that gets bandied about these days.)
So we're back on our fine lines, but even there, the writer isn't alone. In all things, the reader puts their 50%; and in a New York minute, they can pull you off your high wire and have you yoked to the team of grandiose and unapproachable, without you intending it or being the wiser. All because of differing definitions of humble. ;)
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 06:43 pm (UTC)So that you can ignore them as not getting you and do as you please. ;-) Yes, I understand.
But, in a way, you're making my point for me. The reader doesn't know "you" and doesn't know that "you" use grandiloquent prolixity in your everyday language. Some of them are just going to think "you" are pompous. You (you) can't do anything about them. I guess it's a matter of deciding on who your audience is and going with that.
I'm thinking of Cecilia Dart-Thornton, as a for instance. Many people thought her prose exquisite, and she won high praise from a number of sources for her pellucid gems. Others thought her prose gackish treacle that they could barely hack their way through in order to find out what happened to her characters. Neither side was "right," necessarily, because it's all a matter of taste. There will be a market for densely lush prose (especially in fantasy writing) just as there will be a market for more approachable prose.
But we shouldn't make the mistake--and I'm not saying you are doing this--of thinking that voluptuous and erudite prose is a sign of intelligence any more than unadorned prose is a sign of stupidity. I guess it's a matter of whether your preferred style of design is Baroque or whether Shaker is more to your taste. Both are beautiful in their own, individual way. Neither is right or wrong.
no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 06:44 pm (UTC)Tastes like chicken
Date: 9 Jun 2008 07:38 am (UTC)And no, I don't disagree with Madame Verbose. I think she is right on.
Re: Tastes like chicken
Date: 9 Jun 2008 05:12 pm (UTC)Re: Tastes like chicken
Date: 9 Jun 2008 05:48 pm (UTC)Re: Tastes like chicken
Date: 9 Jun 2008 07:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 02:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 08:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 8 Jun 2008 03:03 pm (UTC)