[Prestidigitweeze]

ramsey_isler:

I liked your post because it gives evidence of the power and importance of style despite your general lack of interest in it as compared to, say, narrative.

That feeling of being floored by the emotion and music of language is the main reason I read, not just for the story or "information" (do people actually read made-up stories in search of factual information and, if so, what are encyclopedias?). I tend to respond to the cresting and ebbing of music in its various forms. My sensitivity to it is one of the main reasons I love so much literary fiction.

Ransom:

The one writer about whom I agree with you is Harold Bloom -- not because he "knows a lot of words" but because he makes a lot of bad and arbitrary judgments. Bloom seems to have nothing new to say about Shakespeare despite his parlor-game theory of misreading and his pseudo-Shakespearean way of writing about the subject. Charles Lamb has a wrought and latinate style, too, but is more accomplished and original. De Quincey's famous essay on Macbeth does mimesis better as well.

Bloom's also dead wrong about Yeats.

If you read modern LF, you find words like "espy", "remonstrate", "objurgation" etc. that fell out of use a hundred years ago. What on earth is the point unless they're simply putting on airs? It's childish twaddle.

(1) Coincidentally, your choice of objurgation is an unfortunate one, as it's commonly used in heroic fantasy. I recall reading an entire Jack Vance novel as a kid and finding that every other paragraph seemed to end with "Cudgel uttered an objurgation." This was intended to be a funny and excessively polite way of referring to a person doubled over with pain and screaming a four-letter word. That use of stylistic irony -- writing about low-lifes, murderers and vagrants in the most flowery language possible -- seems to be a trait of Vance's and is shared by other writers in that genre.

(2) You would do well to avoid attributing base motives to other writers -- in literature and even on internet forums -- whenever you're not privy to their intentions or disbelieve the intentions they've stated overtly, since you have no way of knowing whether your suspicions/misgivings are correct.

Originally Posted by Ransom

If someone wrote a story about a doctor or a lawyer who used a ton of obscure medical or legal words that you didn't know, would you call that great writing? I've a feeling that you'd be the first to bellyache about it.

(1) I'd judge the writing by its effectiveness, not by its avoidance of unusual terms. In fact, I'd probably find the excessive use of odd terms interesting.

(2) Again, not a great example, as lots of specialized terms from legalese and the DSM-IIIR became popular because laypersons do enjoy the sound and special meanings of specialized language in context.

Besides which, one of the great books of all time is Sir Thomas Browne's Religio Medici, which uses medical terms and situations to demarcate his spiritual beliefs. It's a beautifully written book -- one that I've enjoyed reading ever since I first discovered it in my parents' library.

You should always find the simplest way you can to say a thing accurately. To not do so would be the equivalent of a guitarist or pianist actually looking for a more difficult way to play the a passage.

As a classical pianist and studio musician, I can pretty much assure you that that analogy doesn't work. You're better off comparing the writer to a composer who goes out of her/his way to write music which is difficult to play, or a musician who looks for such music to perform. You could then argue there was no reason for writing/playing a difficult passage where an easy one would do.

However, the analogy would still be a bad one, since great composers do write intentionally difficult pieces all the time and they are called things like studies and etudes.

You know, it's really pointless to converse with such a thoughtless human. The purpose of all literature is the same as non-fiction obviously—to convey information. . . . It is not to sit and look at all the pretty words, which seems to be your only motive for picking up a book. . . . Why lie to make a false point? Kicks? . . . Why—so you can lie about it afterwards?

Here's where the disquieting generalizations you're making about LF writers, lit professors and others become personal and unpleasant.

You have no right to call other members "worthless humans," nor to assert they're "lying," which degrades the discussion to some sort of post-Jerry-Springer, post-Fox-News accusation tournament, which is exactly what a thread with a title like this one's is in danger of becoming. I'm going to ask you politely to reign it in a touch and speak to others here as if they were worthwhile human beings. Everyone here is worthwhile in the fairest sense.