/lit/ - Literature

>>15308276
Orewell never wrote a good novel in his life

>>15308285
Cool story. We're talking about these rules. Good or bad?

>>15308276

Based

>>15308276
For writing journalism for the masses perhaps.

>>15308297
>6
Go to jail.

>>15308296
It's the typical minimalist dogma, and like all dogmas it lacks imagination and flexibility. It's the equivalent of metre autists, the type who threw a fit over feminine lines in shakespeare

>>15308285
>>15308302
>>15308310

All these fags who have never written anything readable in their lives. Most of these are solid advice, 2 and 3 are debatable, yes, but are still valid in 9/10 cases.
You're not fucking James Joyce ok? You wouldn't go into your first boxing match holding your hands like pic related even though it works for him. Pic related knows what he's doing, you don't. Curb your arrogance.

>>15308285
pyw

>>15308310
" Probably it is better to put off using words as long as possible and get one's meaning as clear as one can through pictures and sensations. Afterward one can choose — not simply accept — the phrases that will best cover the meaning, and then switch round and decide what impressions one's words are likely to make on another person."

"I have not here been considering the literary use of language, but merely language as an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought"

I would say it's not about lack of imagination but instead some tools to provide the pathway from imagination to communication.

>>15308276
It basically just says to write hyper-conservatively unless you have good taste, then write however the hell you want.

>>15308369
>Stop trying to develop your own style, you must conform to my autism
>SO WHAT IF OTHERS HAVE DONE THE SAME BEFORE YOU'RE NOT THEM STOP TRYING TO MAKE ART YOUR OWN WAY CONFORM CONFORM CONFORM CONFORM

>>15308387
Who are you quoting?

if you wanna write like a boring anglo maybe

>>15308369
>Curb your arrogance.
Easy there big guy. All I said was what I thought Orwell meant by "clearly and truthfully" but reflecting on the points you would debate I see your response is merely bait.

>>15308276
>.ru
*thinking*

>>15308387

Not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying learn the basics before you go sperging out like a moron.
If you were trying to learn how to play an instrument you wouldn't say this to your teacher.
'Hurr I don't need to learn chords, I'll just develop my own style.'

That's what you sound like lol.

>>15308369
>NOOOOOOOOOO DON'T EXPERIMENT YOU HAVE TO WRITE LIKE HEMINGWAY MY PROFESSOR TOLD ME IT WAS THE ONLY GOOD WAY TO WRITE

>>15308276
These rules do not apply at all to academic writing, maybe to fiction they do.

>>15308407
Who are you quoting?

>>15308404
Playing an instrument isn't comparable to writing at all. It's the equivalent of being a composer, and then having a guy walk up to you and say not to write fugues or sonnatas because people won't get it. Presenting these things as rules diffenetly doesn't help young artist at all either, it would just spawn a generation of boring, samey minimalist

>>15308391
>>15308417

>Greentext is only for quoting guise

Bro is this your first day on 4chan?

>>15308422

>Playing and instrument isn't comparable to writing at all

Yes it is. Any skill is comparable (not equal, comparable) to learning any other skill. You'd know this if you ever actually tried you bugman.

>>15308422
>yeah bro i'm a ARTIST fuck rules bro amirite

>>15308429
>who are you quoting is only about exact quoting

>>15308437
>Any skill is comparable (not equal, comparable) to learning any other skill
Fucking pseuds I swear. You've likely never played an instrument, or written anything in your life. Fuck off

>>15308422
>"I have not here been considering the literary use of language, but merely language as an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought"

>>15308443

This. As an editor these faggots are the bane of my fucking existence. They all think they're so clever being overly verbose while they're just bloating their manuscript with pretentious nonsense.

>>15308448
pyw

>>15308448
>bugman gets called out
>n-n-no u!
Imagine my shock

>>15308468
>the bug man is the one who doesn't want every thing to be the same bland, characterless minimalist style

>>15308484
>the "bug man" is literally everyone except my strawman
big if true

Orwell was fluent in bureaucrat, and nothing else.
The English language has many monumental figures who passed down the torch through generations, yet in the 21st century people rush to fellate Orwell for some God forsaken reason.
Screw Orwell.

>>15308484

>Taking basic advice makes a text bland

Let's also stop using sentences and punctuation while we're at it. Also who needs chapters am I right? That's just bland, everyone does that.

>>15308531
>who needs chapters
not the oral epicians

>>15308285
holy based and truthpilled

Orwell writes only cardboard characters, and his prose is clunky and riddled with the same stale figures of speech you could find anywhere else. He is a competent political commentator, but he is not an artist in any sense of the word

>>15308531
>Also who needs chapters am I right
Plenty of writers don't use chapters

>>15308276
great rules if you want to write boring wooden shit, yes.

>>15308276
>never use a foreign phrase
Fuck all those british authors from the late 19th and early 20th century that filled their stories with countless phrases in french. You too Oscar Wilde!

>>15308596
Just learn french, it's not that hard

What about Pound?
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69409/a-retrospect-and-a-few-donts

OP here, Guess i should have emphasised this quote from the essay:

>"I have not here been considering the literary use of language, but merely language as an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought."

Might have saved a lot of misunderstanding lol.

>>15308622
>Direct treatment of the “thing” whether subjective or objective.
>To use absolutely no word that does not contribute to the presentation.
>As regarding rhythm: to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in sequence of a metronome.
That... actually not bad. His rules can be summarized as "don't be aimless and don't cohere to autistic rules others try to force on you"

>>15308607
I'm in a conundrum, I'd like to read books in french, I like many french authors and I think learning french wouldn't be very difficult (I'm a native spanish speaker). But I loathe the sound of it, I can't stand to listen to a frenchman.

>>15308629
>here are rules for prose
>wait no don't apply them to novels

All the pseuds on this board are exposing themselves yet again. Writing should convey clarity of thought, it should reflect your thinking. Writing for the effect of inflating your ego or masking meaning with cliches and dodgy language makes you look like a fucking clown.

If you've read the essay OP linked, you would better understand the meaning of these rules beyond writing for low IQ Americans. He's quoting academics who use latin as ways to say things which are logical shlop when put into plain language. It's important to understand that in no way is Orwell talking about poetry or anything similar.


>>15308629
Yes, you should've.

>>15308651
>misquoting an essay you've never read
shiggydiggy

>>15308678
t. Monolingual
Differenr cultures have different concepts and words that embody those concepts
Sometimes it's more efficent to use a latin phrase to explain things rather than vernacular

>>15308704
Obviously the use of foreign words isn't inherently bad, retard. Congrats on pointing that out. What Orwell is saying is that foreign words can be used to mask a lack meaning and to obscure interpretations in writing when plain English could very easily substitute and make it clear that what the writer is actually saying is nonsense. Again, read the fucking essay.

>>15308622
Lots of good advice but I see it specifically as an elaboration of imagism rather than just "how to write well."
t. not a Pound expert

>>15308276
full time writer here
yes, most of these are pretty sensible if you want to get your message across. certainly some of them are included in a lot of style guides e.g. the guardian one, which is regarded as one of the best.
i try to follow rules 2 and 4 all the time, but i have probably broken rules 1 and 3 more times than i can count. i work in a niche area, so i have broken rule 5 too. thank goodness for rule 6.

>>15308793
Very droll image lol. You haven't broken rule 5 if you need to use foreign words to express yourself.

>>15308793
>more times than i can count
rule 1

>>15308276
>if it’s possible to cut a word out, ALWAYS cut it out
>not ‘if it’s possible to cut a word out, cut it out’

>>15308918

>>15308918
>not 'if it's possible to cut a word, cut.'

>>15308931
>words? cut!

>>15308918
>‘if it’s possible to cut a word out, cut it out’
Too many long words and too many innecessary words
>If you can cut a word, cut it.

>>15308918
>>15308931
>>15308939
>>15309022
getting close to invoking rule 6

>>15309022
Be careful with the verbosity buddy; your keyboard is not going to last forever.
>Cut extraneous words.

>>15308678
>Writing should convey clarity of thought, it should reflect your thinking. Writing for the effect of inflating your ego or masking meaning with cliches and dodgy language makes you look like a fucking clown.
Yeah, cool, but most people here are writing fiction and not essays. A fictional tale has essentially nothing to do with your thoughts and their clarity, usually it's not dealing with thoughts at all, at least not literally.

>>15308793
You broke rule 4 twice in this short post.

>>15308547

Based

>>15309184
>extraneous
Too big
>cut useless words

>>15309477
many words can be extraneous but not useless. for example, most adjectives.

>>15309436
>Yeah, cool, but most people here are writing fiction and not essays. A fictional tale has essentially nothing to do with your thoughts and their clarity, usually it's not dealing with thoughts at all, at least not literally.
See
>>15308629
Also, most people here are shitposters who hardly read (this thread as an example) and especially don't write.

>>15308276
Fucking a*glos are devoid of any style.

>>15308276
to each rule append the clause 'unless you're dfw'

>>15308285
fpbp

>>15308276
These rules might be fine when writing an essay, or perhaps when trying to communicate science to the masses.
But when writing a novel, this is shit advice.

you can follow all these rules without writing blandly or simply or hemingway-y

>>15308939
this

>>15308369
Jesus Christ that comparison is so shit, couldn't be written by anyone with even a shred of intellectual honesty.
Point is not to emulate James Joyce as you imply, rather to not restrict yourself by something like OP's pic.

Also suspect you haven't written, nor will ever write anything worth reading - should probably be "curbing" your own arrogance.

>>15308276
After the essay -- the historian's apology of the Gulags example is apropos and typical of authors in the discipline [frustrated literati in a joke profession.]

>>15308285
>Orewell never wrote a good novel in his life
His star is hitched to his essays, despite the prescience of his political fiction.

>>15308622
>Pound
Yes. There are absolutes of speech (musicality) that must inform composition in the written word -- ideally in such a way that it can be read aloud with no surfeit of morphemes or undue demands on breath [the composer of music has the luxury of instrumentation to cover the need for breath; texts have to be structured for soloists' performance.]

>>15308643
>I loathe the sound of it, I can't stand to listen to a frenchman.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pY-0JfEdLY
Depends on the region [just as the eponymous New York cab driver's accent makes English sound barbaric]

>>15308276
These seem like rules for journalism, not prose.

>>15308276
What does he mean by "say anything outright barbarous"

>>15308918
>not "cut unnecessary words"

>>15313727
>not 'cut extra words'
>note the single mark quotes to save space

>>15308678
*should hof

>>15308276
These rules should be kept in mind by all writers and most programmers too.

>>15308310
>like all dogmas it lacks imagination and flexibility

Notice how the last rule is the ultimate loophole? Writing takes talent, and some people are born with it. No amount of money, education, or rule-following will make you a writer if you don't have talent.

>>15308678
This

Words are not magic. Things exist even if you don't name them, and naming something doesn't make it exist. Language is just a way to get the contents of your head into someone else's head. Take the Chomskypill

>>15308642
>don't cohere to (((autistic rules others try to force on you)))

This. For bonus points look up Lancelot Hogben, one of the guys Orwell uses as an example of bad writing, and the story of how he was ripped off by his grad students