George Orwell thought not. So should foreign words and phrases really be verboten, or can they add a certain je ne sais quoi to your magnum opus? Orwell’s essay Politics and the English Language is a good read for anyone interested in the art of clear and truthful written communication. I recommend it as a […]
Ever felt the need to protect your hoard from a marauding horde? Today, I show you how…to get the spellings right, anyway. I love a good homophone. That, just to clarify matters, is a word whose pronunciation is the same as another’s, but whose spelling and/or definition is different. If you’d like to familiarise yourself […]
Editing is all about improving your written work, but do you really know what you’re doing when you sit down to edit? So take some tips from a past winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, because you might as well learn not only how to edit like a pro, but how to edit like […]
Some people get quite upset about the use of ‘decimate’ to mean a large reduction in a population (see sense 3 below). This is usually because they think its usage should be confined to the so-called original sense (see 1 and 2 below). By the way, they’re generally the same people who’ll also go on […]
Pudding: a straightforward, inoffensive sort of word, right? So why on earth, I hear you ask, is it the word of the week? Well, dear reader, I’ve chosen to feature ‘pudding’ because as words go, it’s a veritable wolf in sheep’s clothing. For when used in sense number 1 mentioned below, the word ‘pudding’ is […]
This week’s word is offered by way of elucidating something for my own benefit. I know deep in my heart that the words ‘cognate’ and ‘cognitive’ don’t mean anything like the same thing, but I still have a nasty habit–especially when writing quickly–of using them as if they do. Let’s look at their differences as […]
The passive voice: anyone who’s ever written a lab report or student essay will be mighty familiar with this concept. And they’ll possibly, like me, think it’s an absolute disaster. So, in case you’re among the fortunate uninitiated, what is the passive voice? Well, it’s that special stylistic affectation which makes most academic writing almost […]
Today’s word is one of those whose non-medical usage annoys doctors. I shouldn’t say this, but that fact really makes me want to find a doctor to torment. Suffice it to say I won’t have to look far if I’m to execute my dastardly plan. The issue is this: patients and doctors use the word […]
You’ve probably noticed that I’m quite fond of reappraising established writing advice. Why? Well, I suspect much of it doesn’t work, in that it fails to improve the writing of the people who apply it. So my bank holiday post this week comes in the form of a warning: when you take advice on your writing, […]
When Stevie Wonder just called to say he loved us, he was engaging in a purely phatic communication. And he meant it from the bottom of his heart, folks.