Clichés - Writing - Bloggercises

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Clichés Writing - Bloggercises

Buzz off

August 26th 2011 22:34

If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out, said George Orwell in his rules of good writing. Had he been clairvoyant, he might have been referring to the following sentence.

"For 35 years, Canadian Living has been developing creative meal solutions for Canadian families."

Good on them. If only they would stick to recipes, within which the scope for mangling language is limited.

Of course, this atrocity has most likely been committed by someone outside the Canadian Living organisation. It has almost certainly been committed by someone from the International War on Language Alliance, also known as marketing.

Some people should never be allowed near a keyboard.

For anyone in marketing unsure why I have steam pouring from my ears, I appeal to any atom or two of interest in the integrity of language which remains within your buzz word-addled brain.

I do so by asking what is wrong with the following:

"For 35 years, Canadian Living has been developing creative meals for Canadian families."

Buzz words are instant clichés. They are communication tools for the lazy and the unimaginative. Tell that to your marketing lecturer.

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Posted By: Chris Champion - Category: A writer's tool kit, Clichés, Language, Redundancies, Writing

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Make it sing 5: Carl Hiaasen creates a character

March 24th 2011 05:44

There are two ways for a novelist to put flesh and substance on a character: the dull way or the creative way.

Let’s take, for example, a character who has entered her advanced years with a rancorously judgmental attitude to life.

She’s bitter and twisted, and the novelist could describe her in those words. That, however, would be a cliché, and attractive to only the most undemanding of readers.

Or the writer could try letting the reader work it out on their own through the story. Some writers will introduce the evidence slowly. Some, like the masterful Carl Hiaasen in his new novel, Nature Girl, will give it to you in a rush of creative brilliance.

Hiaasen introduces a new character at the start of Chapter 7 with the following description: “Disappointment was the fuel that cranked the aging pistons of Della Shreave Renfroe Landry – disappointment in the father who’d cashed out his Shell Oil pension early and invested every dollar in the DeLorean Motor Company; disappointment in the mother who’d refused to hock her heirloom earrings and send Della to a prep school favored by the tall rangy sons of petroleum tycoons; disappointment in the three successive husbands who’d died without leaving Della wealthy and carefree; disappointment in the one daughter who’d run off to follow a rock band called Phish, then married a public defender who was a known Democrat and quite possibly a Jew; disappointment in the other daughter, who’d taken a nursing degree and, instead of bagging the first available neurosurgeon, hook ed up with the World Health Organisation amd moved to Calcutta.”

It’s a joyous romp of a sentence. It’s Carl Hiaasen doing what he does best, satirising America’s social, political and criminal misfits

And showing us what makes good writing.

Remember the words of our two great guides, Mark Twain, who said, "The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug," and The Round Mound of Sound, who said, "Make it sing."

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Posted By: Chris Champion - Category: Books, Clichés, Make it sing, Writing

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Dark corners of the language: clichés

February 1st 2010 05:17

We have in the past advised novice writers against using clichés. There no known excuse to use a cliché, we said. There is no imaginable circumstance in the occupied universe, we advised, that can justify using a cliché.

Well, we got that wrong.

John Croucher has just published a book full of clichés, and every one of them is justified.

Croucher is a professor at Australia’s Macquarie Graduate School of Management, and his book is more about the business world than grammar. The book’s dedication is to ``all those suckers who believe everything people tell them''.

However, Bloggercises got attentive on behalf of writers and anyone interested in language when Croucher asserted that clichés often exist today because they are used as a way to disguise meaning. To put it plainly, Croucher says clichés often mean the opposite of what they look like they mean.

Sound crazy? We thought so too. So here are some examples, and after reading them it is apparent that Croucher has cleverly identified something here.

Cliché: Are you making a fashion statement?
Real meaning: You look ridiculous.

Cliché: Our company is containing costs.
Real meaning: Our company is maximising management salaries and bonuses and minimising the wages of everyone else.

Cliché: You deserve better than me.
Real meaning: I want better than you.

Cliché: Our company is seeking a self-starter.
Real meaning: In this role, nobody is going to help you whatsoever.

Cliché: This is a challenging role.
Real meaning: Everyone is going to hate you.

Cliché: This property is a golden opportunity.
Real meaning: This property is a golden opportunity for the agent to make a commission.

Croucher says the reverse cliché phenomenon is a result of a competitive world. They are, he says, “a form of modern punishment”.

``I watch a lot of TV and read a lot of papers and, being in management school, I get a lot of management speak paradigm shifts and synergies: tools for punishing people,'' he said.

``But because this is a dog-eat-dog world, because we need to get that competitive edge, we lie more. A lot of people look good on paper, because people tell us what we want to hear. People lie all the time, and others believe them because they want to.”

In other words, clichés are corporate or self-promoting double-speak, and most of us fall for it.

Caveat emptor.

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Posted By: Chris Champion - Category: A writer's tool kit, Clichés, Language, Writing

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Out, damn'd cliché 2

December 22nd 2008 11:28

Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

Orwell's edict, a fundamental rule of good writing, is about clichés. The word is taken from the French word for stereotype. In English, we use it to denote words, phrases or ideas which have been overused to the point where they lose their force.

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