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Thousands of overused words and phrases--and alternatives to them--are compiled in this ultimate writer's reference, composing the perfect companion for those seeking to weed out bland, commonplace content and replace it with crisp, concise prose. Entertaining examples of poor vocabulary make for great browsing while specific clichés and sharper options are also featured. Humorous and enlightening, this updated edition contains more than 100 new entries and 50 new exemplary sentences.… (más)
Hey, I know, let's all become the pompous vocabulary police and take all the personality out of our writing! Tedious to read and filled with unimaginative alternatives to what the authors believe are overused phrases (but are pretty much every phrase you've ever heard - hackneyed or not), this book is helpful only if you want to write like this (taken from a passage where one of the authors defends his use of acerbic commentary in the book):
This pedagogy may strike some as unworkable, and perhaps its efficacy is suspect, but we surely know that other methods of tutelage are largely unsuccessful.
Sheesh! Look, I understand that clichés are overused, but suggesting I replace "raining cats and dogs" with "raining" doesn't improve the writing, it just makes it more boring. ( )
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink. GEORGE ORWELL, Politics and the English Language
Thoughts, that breathe, and words, that burn. Thomas Gray, The Progress of Poesy
Good as is discourse, silence is better and shames it. RALPH WALDO EMERSON, Circles
For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, Action, nor utterance nor the power of speech, To stir men's blood WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Julis Caesar, act 3, scene 2
Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become character. Watch you character; it becomes destiny. ANONYMOUS
Never do I ever want to hear another word. There isn't one I haven't heard. ALAN JAY LERNER and FREDERIK LOEWE, My Fair Lady
Dedicatoria
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
To Betty--unambivalently
Primeras palabras
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
[Apologia] The Dimwit's Dictionary will annoy some people and amuse others.
[Foreword] When Robert Hartwell Fiske confronts Saint Peter, I hope he remembers to tell the man that he is the founding editor of The Vocabula Review, the online magazine devoted to contemporary language, its delights and its disasters.
Whereas, a witticism is a clever remark or phrase -- indeed, the height of expression -- a "dimwitticism" is the converse, it is a commonplace remark or phrase.
Citas
Últimas palabras
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
[Apologia] This pedagogy may strike some as unworkable, and perhaps its efficacy is suspect, but we surely know that the other methods of tutelage are largely unsuccessful.
[Foreword] As it happens, I believe in all this, too, which makes it an honor to salute a fellow fanatic and wish him and his book the great good fortune both deserve.
Thousands of overused words and phrases--and alternatives to them--are compiled in this ultimate writer's reference, composing the perfect companion for those seeking to weed out bland, commonplace content and replace it with crisp, concise prose. Entertaining examples of poor vocabulary make for great browsing while specific clichés and sharper options are also featured. Humorous and enlightening, this updated edition contains more than 100 new entries and 50 new exemplary sentences.
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This pedagogy may strike some as unworkable, and perhaps its efficacy is suspect, but we surely know that other methods of tutelage are largely unsuccessful.
Sheesh! Look, I understand that clichés are overused, but suggesting I replace "raining cats and dogs" with "raining" doesn't improve the writing, it just makes it more boring. (