Writers who intentionally make their sentences overly complicated and bloated with super obscure adjectives which requires the reader to pull out a thesaurus just to translate really irritate me for some reason. It just comes across as pretentious bloat to make it *sound* like theyre saying something smart when in reality nothing of value is actually being said. Its fine in poetry and creative writings where alliteration and such are desireable, but daily life blogs? No that just screams "i have a complex and need to over-compensate through big words" The whole point of language in general (IMO) is to convey the most amount of meaning with the least amount of effort on both the speaker and listeners part.
3 years ago
I disagree with the statement made: "The whole point of language in general (IMO) is to convey the most amount of meaning with the least amount of effort on both the speaker and listeners part". This may apply to functional technical documentation, but language is a much richer and serves many more purposes than just the conveying of information. It can serve to entertain, to allude, to express solidatity, to express ones imagination., and many many more purposes besides. 路 3 years ago
I wholeheartedly identify with the expression conveyed in the miniature essay articulated here. I also interpret said writers with such negative emotions from time to time. :P 路 3 years ago
@smokey Oh yeah. That example really feels like something from some teenager's fan fic. That's 100% bad writing. 路 3 years ago
there is a balance to be struck between trying to be practical and trying to fully immerse the reader in the visuals and feelings of what's being written about. complicated and obscure words aren't always necessary but sometimes they have a nuance that makes sense for their use. 路 3 years ago
I agree with alot of point made, writing is obviously a creative process and people are allowed to write however they want in whatever way they feel like. I dont want to step on the toes of anyone who *does* like flowery writing styles since its a personal taste thing. I do feel annoyance at it all the same. Maybe i should give an example of what i mean by overly complicated.
sentence 1. "i journeyed to the location in which goods and commodities are distributed so that i may procure a capsule of caffinated brew from the beans of the coffea plant"
sentence 2. " i went to the store to buy some coffee"
The amount of information is the same, the word count is not. 路 3 years ago
@marginalia Same thing happens to me. I try to fix up my writing after the fact, but there's only so much time in the day for it, especially for personal writing. Unfortunately I tend to write like I think... a bit convoluted. 路 3 years ago
I agree in principle, but I also recognize that "super obscure" is subjective. I was accused a lot as a child of having not written the things I'd written because I read a lot of old literature and knew words adults thought I shouldn't. 路 3 years ago
Some write for themselves first and the readership second. I think I'm sometimes guilty of dusty and overcomplicated language, but it depends a lot of what I read. If I'm in a period where I read a lot of old books my writing definitely tends to resemble the convoluted sentence structure that was popular among authors in that period. It's not because I think it's somehow impressive to write like that, but I can't help but sponge up writing styles. 路 3 years ago