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johnslat · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 12:22 pm Post subject: Write On

"The Sense of Style: Psycholinguist Steven Pinker on the Art and Science of Beautiful Writing
by Maria Popova

“Every generation believes that the kids today are degrading the language and taking civilization down with it.”

http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/10/10/steven-pinker-sense-of-style/

Comments?

Regards,
John

buravirgil · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 2:01 pm Post subject:

Great website and Maria Popova is fun to follow. I like Pinker okay and was intrigued by topics in psycholinguistics when a student. There's far more infuriating opinion out of Harvard, that's for sure. As for the book's assertions on style, I don't find them radical or controversial to articles and guides I read twenty years ago. I can take issue with

A skilled writer should know what those functions are and push back against copy editors who, under the influence of grammatically naïve style guides, blue-pencil every passive construction they spot into an active one.

I was trained as an editor twenty years ago, and taught to respect the differences/uses/advantages of voice. I suppose Pinker's experience is first-hand, and copy-editing is an exploitive trade (except for the most prominent of positions), so I don't doubt many copy-editors do a minimum, but it wasn't my training. I was also taught a non-specific use of utilize was bad copy-writing, but see it every where by everybody. Confused

So I'm happy Pinker's assertions are largely accepted.

johnslat · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 3:22 pm Post subject:

The passive voice must be done away with. And so must ending sentences with propositions. Very Happy

Regards,
John

buravirgil · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 3:38 pm Post subject:

Sashadroogie · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 5:35 pm Post subject:

What does King have to say on this matter?