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Anyone else slightly annoyed at Tycho's increasing sentence complexity?
Moloz
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Registered User regular
Is it really necessary to construct heavily cornered contexts in order to achieve good literature? Or a good reading for that matter? Does one have to assume the "intelligent" masses of readers are innately interested in desciphering the intimate innerworkings of one's interesting, but otherwise horribly intricated thoughts, in order to produce but a simple comment? See what I mean?
Sometimes the shortest distance between two points IS a straight line, even on paper. That being said, browsing Tycho's older posts is oftenly more rewarding, both in terms of information and entertainment, than many of his current ones. Being a regular PA reader since years back, I can't help but notice an increase in sentence "luggage" versus actual communication. As a non-english-native, while I enjoy the simple, witty, writings of one such Terry Pratchett, and (sometimes) struggle a bit through the more spectacular, but complex style of a R.R. Martin, it is plain hard for me to thoroughly read and understand some of Tycho's sentences. I can do it, eventually, but by then the purpose of the sentence is rather lost to me, and I must re-read it once or twice in order to correctly perceive the contained.
Taking into account the rather bloggish, journalistic-oriented nature of PA, this is somewhat puzzling, and I can only think of a few reasons for it (these are just exploits of a boredom overdose, so bear with me and please; note I am not (primarily) trying to make fun of the said writer, who I respect and read daily):
- one possible explanation is the author is actually afraid that his opinions and feelings will be too accesible for the mundane population, perharps rendering them slightly trivial, beyond the borders of a dubious tagma of supposedly elite readers. He therefore elaborates a smooth syntax equivalent of an Enigma cypher, hoping the allied minds of the simple will not try to reap the fruits of his intellect.
- he got lost in it. Knowing the PA Tycho, we all suspect he will ardently favor the complicated versus the simple, the baroque versus the minimalism, the grotesque versus pink, the sour mistery behind a mind-boggling collection of words versus the tasteless aspect of a newspaper column. However, over the years, one's tendency to overcome the routine can also take unfortunate, exaggerate turns, and this can be progressively seen in Tycho's writing.
- overzealous "artistic" treatment of the sentence. This is easily seen at aspiring (but oftenly talented) actors, who seldom feel the need to over emphasise their expressed emotions, hoping the audience will be responsive to their effort. While some acknowledge this is merely a tool of the mediocre, or simply a bad habit that can easily iritate the exercised eye, others bring it to the extent of an art, making it into virtuoso tour-de-forces. However the essence of the show is more than often lost into this effort, and the audience is left looking more at the mimics and funny gestures rather than the overall performance.
Feel free to gnaw at all these as you like, at least it will satisfy my curiosity over the issue.
I appologise in advance if I posted in the wrong section.
Sometimes the shortest distance between two points IS a straight line, even on paper. That being said, browsing Tycho's older posts is oftenly more rewarding, both in terms of information and entertainment, than many of his current ones. Being a regular PA reader since years back, I can't help but notice an increase in sentence "luggage" versus actual communication. As a non-english-native, while I enjoy the simple, witty, writings of one such Terry Pratchett, and (sometimes) struggle a bit through the more spectacular, but complex style of a R.R. Martin, it is plain hard for me to thoroughly read and understand some of Tycho's sentences. I can do it, eventually, but by then the purpose of the sentence is rather lost to me, and I must re-read it once or twice in order to correctly perceive the contained.
Taking into account the rather bloggish, journalistic-oriented nature of PA, this is somewhat puzzling, and I can only think of a few reasons for it (these are just exploits of a boredom overdose, so bear with me and please; note I am not (primarily) trying to make fun of the said writer, who I respect and read daily):
- one possible explanation is the author is actually afraid that his opinions and feelings will be too accesible for the mundane population, perharps rendering them slightly trivial, beyond the borders of a dubious tagma of supposedly elite readers. He therefore elaborates a smooth syntax equivalent of an Enigma cypher, hoping the allied minds of the simple will not try to reap the fruits of his intellect.
- he got lost in it. Knowing the PA Tycho, we all suspect he will ardently favor the complicated versus the simple, the baroque versus the minimalism, the grotesque versus pink, the sour mistery behind a mind-boggling collection of words versus the tasteless aspect of a newspaper column. However, over the years, one's tendency to overcome the routine can also take unfortunate, exaggerate turns, and this can be progressively seen in Tycho's writing.
- overzealous "artistic" treatment of the sentence. This is easily seen at aspiring (but oftenly talented) actors, who seldom feel the need to over emphasise their expressed emotions, hoping the audience will be responsive to their effort. While some acknowledge this is merely a tool of the mediocre, or simply a bad habit that can easily iritate the exercised eye, others bring it to the extent of an art, making it into virtuoso tour-de-forces. However the essence of the show is more than often lost into this effort, and the audience is left looking more at the mimics and funny gestures rather than the overall performance.
Feel free to gnaw at all these as you like, at least it will satisfy my curiosity over the issue.
I appologise in advance if I posted in the wrong section.
Moloz on
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EDIT: I really almost want this thread to not get locked...
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Not that it's actually become more prevalent (at least that I can tell) or that I personally find it jarring at all, but he is in the minority in an internet full of people who seem incapable of forming sentences outside of a twitter-style environment.
Viva La Verbosity, people.
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Main Entry: clever
Part of Speech: adjective
Definition: bright, ingenious
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No, that would be pretty difficult. Though I think he definitely tends towards a higher vocabulary than most even just when speaking plainly.
Really, I get the feeling he just has a lot of fun writing in his overly verbose style, I picture it like a little bit of a game for him. And, I mean, it is fun to flex your vocabulary, regardless of how bad I am at it. Personally I have no problem with it, I enjoy his posts.
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No, you can usually tell when someone does that. I think Tycho came by his style honestly; I always feel a little bad for the nerds who read his stuff and think the only explanation is that he must be bullshitting them, because they must not be exposed to very much in the way of variety.
My reaction to the op: "No way I'm reading all that."
I think I may need to re-examine my values.
That's my theory, anyway.
Whether it's actually fun and funny is up to you.
Now don't take this as some criticism of Tycho and what he does. I like how he writes and I find it amusing what he writes about, so this is just my take on why he writes in the manner he does. It's all for a laugh anyways.
This kind of reminds me of a discussion I was involved with on a communication and language forum. Ironically, I mentioned that non-idiomatic phrasing irritates me, especially when it's used in excess. This caused a pretty vocal response from a lot of people, the intellectual equivalent of telling a group of Steelers fans that their team is bad. I brought it up because a friend used to abuse the hell out of the word 'perturbed'. An example of this would be, "I was pretty perturbed to hear about the way the professor curved the final". Not only does a sentence like that sound awkward to me, I feel it's less clear than saying, "I'm pissed at the way the professor curved the final." Ultimately, it was just prescriptivism.
I think that a lot of the people feel that language ought to be as stable as math or science, and it takes them out of their comfort zone when it isn't. Maybe it's a byproduct of our educational system teaching the three areas in the same way.
Given that Tycho reads SciFi, he's pretty much guaranteed to have been exposed to the descendants of Wells.
By the way, I plug words into the thesaurus all the time when writing, although that's because I'll only settle for the perfect word and it's always at the tip of my tongue.
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'oftenly'?! Is that like 'irregardless'?
I enjoy Tycho's style greatly, and the verbosity is done for (and succeeds at) great comedic effect, I think. But I am biased, because my favorite authors are those who play with linguistics like Gene Wolfe and Neal Stephenson.
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Maybe if he were a schoolboy who felt the need for an ego boost, but he's not. I get a pretty strong vibe that he's fairly humble, especially whenever you read him giving praise to another human being.
I find your amusing approach to this altercation to be absurdly aggravating, as I was attempting to assay an antic articulation of aureately abundant arguments on this affair myself.
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Its like a cheeseburger versus bourban pepper filet mignon. The complexity of the latter does not equate to a worse meal.
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I agree with you, but I want to delve a bit further into that... It's all about the way you view language-- is it a means to an end (simply a way to communicate a thought) or is an art in itself (the journey is more important than the destination). I'd say that those who view it as more of an art are definitely in the minority. Just look at the most popular modern books and notice how easy to read they are. I'd think it might be better said that some people take to language the way others take to cars.
Also, what Jack said.