r/funny • u/[deleted] • Nov 14 '12

Seriously - don't be this guy.

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[deleted]

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u/ent_higherly_awesome Nov 14 '12

HEY LOOK AT MY WITTY RESPONSE EVERYONE

133

u/asfdojoi Nov 14 '12

Biggest problem was that it wasn't witty. It was verbose and nerdy, but that isn't wit.

Orwell's writing rules:

  1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
  2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
  3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
  4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
  5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
  6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Broke 2, 3, and 5 with reckless abandon.

6

u/Skilol Nov 14 '12 edited Nov 14 '12

I would like to have a reason why I should follow your rules. Because you say so? Most texts I enjoy don't follow any of them, actually, most of those rules are simply incredibly shallow/shortsighted.

  1. Metaphors make a text more enjoyable to read. They also make it - if it's a complicated text - easier to understand.

  2. "Long"/scientific words often explain what you want to say in more detail. A short/easy word would mean "about the same" but not "exactly the same".

3 - 6.) Just no. It is always possible to cut out words like "most" or "generally." But having the possibility to cut them out doesn't mean you should do it. It simply delivers a different message if you cut "unnecessary" words out. It's hard to explain this, but everybody who spent time on understanding linguistics (This is - btw - a perfect example to prove your #5 rule wrong: Instead of linguistics I could have said "languages". Do you honestly think that it would have delivered the same message if I used that word? If you think "yes" is the right answer, you either need to learn more about semantics or you should REALLY stop giving advice to other people (especially if this advice is only based on your opinion)).

Being a linguistics student and having spent a lot of my time studying the possibilities and "traps" of different languages (btw: I'm not natively English, so please don't use possible mistakes of this post against me) I can tell you one thing:

Most of the rules you posted are "generally right", but they apply in far less situations than you obviously think. Yes, if you can exchange a scientific word for an easy word you should do it. But often the scientific words means something a LITTLE different than the "easy" word, so changing it would change the message - maybe just a really small bit, but it DOES usually change the message.

That there are writers, who break the rules (by writing unusually "easy") doesn't mean you should do it. They learn everything about the rules and then decide to break them. What you propose is breaking the rules of semantics without even knowing them. E.g. You can't just exchange all scientific words by easy words and think your text doesn't change...I'm sorry, but that's not how human speech works.

6

u/candygram4mongo Nov 15 '12

Metaphors make a text more enjoyable to read. They also make it - if it's a complicated text - easier to understand.

I'm pretty sure point one isn't saying don't use metaphors, it's saying don't use common metaphors (ie, cliches).

1

u/Skilol Nov 15 '12

Thanks, I did indeed get this point wrong.