51–60 of 71 posts
Kept out of sight in this rogue essay is the classic question: Who's your audience? If you're writing for yourself (and maybe a very small number of equally erudite readers) cut loose! Embrace "anfractuous density and heedless flamboyance." But if you're trying to change people's minds, or share knowledge widely, everything in this essay is defiantly at odds with what's necessary to get the rest of the world to pay a…
>And—well, here,
That was especially egregious. And! but—well, here, I guess, if I had to guess—which I don't(but I will)—the purpose of his essay seems to be, that; unintended ambiguity is good and really quite nice from an aesthetic standpoint. David Bently Hart seems to be the anti-McCarthy and falls into all the same traps as McCarthy, just walks into them backwards and blindfolded through a parentheses and a digression instead of jumping in head first.
But a polemic that shit-talks the best authors of the 20th century is mid and unpersuasive.
> A good part of our sleepes is peeced out with visions, Because of current slang, I read this as “peaced out” then realized it’s “pieced out”. Peace out
Kept out of sight in this rogue essay is the classic question: Who's your audience? If you're writing for yourself (and maybe a very small number of equally erudite readers) cut loose! Embrace "anfractuous density and heedless flamboyance." But if you're trying to change people's minds, or share knowledge widely, everything in this essay is defiantly at odds with what's necessary to get the rest of the world to pay a…
Like casting pearls before swine.
Look, I am in no position to seriously critique the author’s writing. He clearly has linguistic chops. But what kind of bunk is this? We get it, the flowery, overdrawn language of yore is more expressive. But that kind of writing gets in its own way. Words seem to trump concept. But reading that sort of writing feels like being in a museum; sure that Victorian gown looks pretty but does anyone actually want to wear i…
I'm surprised to note -- if the discussion here is any evidence, then anger and literacy are inversely correlated.
As someone with english as my second language this style is just too much to bother. Sure, I get that it is elegant and precise. But for me it results in stilted reading. Hence I disagree with the "Never write for your audience" part of the essay.