let's talk about 'purple prose'

[Anonymous No.4973076]

so 'purple prose' is language so flowery that the content is obfuscated and the reader may have a hard time understanding the subject matter

is this a real thing? couldn't 'pp' just be a sort of catchall accusation a person can fling at a text if they found it annoyingly difficult?

what writers use 'pp'? is it intentional? what are your thoughts?

[Anonymous No.4973195]

It isn't a matter of the prose being "difficult." It has to do with breaking the dramatic tension of a scene, ruining the flow of dialogue or narration, or otherwise making a paragraph that could be concise overly verbose and flowery in a way that adds nothing to the paragraph.

[Anonymous No.4973208]

Purple Prose is easy to detect if it doesn't fit with the rest of the writing.

Example

'Harry opened the door and walked inside.'

'The tired Harry grudgingly raised his bored arm to the rusted gold doorknob, turning it just as much is needed. The heavy door swung open with groaned precision and revealed another dark room. Harry stumbled through to blackness.'

[Anonymous No.4973228]

>>4973208
see the second one is far more interesting to me

[Anonymous No.4973231]

>>4973076
>GRIMACE prose
It's a thing

[Anonymous No.4973241]

I wonder when /lit/ will realize calling prose "purple" isn't a legitimate critique of it.

Probably never.

[Anonymous No.4973247]

>>4973195
This. Purple prose draws the readers attention to the prose more so than the actual subject matter. This isn't a problem as such if the writing is any good, but another innate characteristic of purple prose is that it is almost universally awful.

[Anonymous No.4973272]

Purple prose is definitely real, but unfortunately it has become one of those phrases that gets thrown around meaninglessly. It's predominantly about pace.

The most famous example is the opening to Paul Clifford:
>It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents — except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.

And you know what? As an opening, that's perfectly fine. The trouble is that he goes on like this for 1000 pages, making it impossible to vary tempo or present contrast. The pace is fixed to the labouring, expositionary style that works well to set the scene but cannot present action or build suspense. However, these days no one has read all 1000 pages of Paul Clifford. They read the intro and assume that this is a bad writing style that they must eschew. This is also convenient for them because now they can pretend they're not using big words on purpose, rather than because they don't know what they mean.

[Anonymous No.4973279]

>>4973272
Yes, this is a much better opening than "It was raining". Same deal with >>4973208, if it's in the beginning of the book or a chapter, the second version works much better than the first one.

[Anonymous No.4973291]

>>4973279

Nah, in >>4973208 the second is just bad. Bored arm? Groaned precision? The tired Harry? Not every noun needs an adjective.

[Anonymous No.4973294]

Like Mary Sue or cliche or whatever it can be valid or invalid criticism depending on how it's used.
Intricate prose can definitely be good, purple prose is when it goes beyond and it reads like the author was jerking off over a thesaurus while writing. Eragon for instance got a lot of flak for it, there was a site with some choice excerpts but I don't remember it..
I'm not sure if this picture counts but I do love it.

[Anonymous No.4973297]

>>4973279
there are lots of mental midgets here who think the most plainly stated writing is the best, without exception

i blame comic books

still, at least none of these people will write anything worth reading, so there's comfort in that

[Anonymous No.4973302]

>>4973291
Compared to the first sentence? Yeah, it is better. "Harry opened the door and walked inside." is such a boring, inconsequential turd of a sentence it'd be better just to lance the wart right out of whatever text you're writing.

[Anonymous No.4973322]

>>4973302

If I read "Harry opened the door and walked inside" I wouldn't put the book down. I'd read the next sentence. It's not terribly exciting, but it does not jar good taste like "The tired Henry". Putting a determiner to a proper noun is a pretty bold thing to do. You best have a pretty damn good idea of where you're going with it.

[Anonymous No.4973333]

>>4973322
>it does not jar good taste

how would you know

[Anonymous No.4973344]

>>4973294
>spends two pages describind the girl
>"you are quite beautiful, princess bronwyn"

[Anonymous No.4973394]

I think it mainly depends on the context of the writing.
For example, if I were to take out a random passage of Virginia Woolf's 'The Waves' and plant it in a work of 'plain' writing - it would look like purple prose.
If the whole work is descriptive then its not purple prose.

Another factor is using unnecessary words in a sentence. >>4973208 explains it well. The second sentence has far too many words that are of little to no need - they don't really help move the story along. They stick out like a soe thumb.

[Anonymous No.4973557]

>>4973208
This is a bad example
In the first part, you imply there's a normal door, a normal action and a normal harry.

In the second part, you imply there's Harry, who is tired (what has he done?), a door with a rusted gold doorknob (someone who wants the impression they can afford gold? narcissists manor?), turning it just as much as needed (this straight up implies he's sneaking around, completely different to the first part), the heavy door (big door, very money, much opulence), groaned precision (what) (are you fucking admiring how all doors open), revealed another (he's been exploring for a while), dark room (there's no power, and being in a mansion it is probably set in the past), Harry stumbled (he has a hurt leg, maybe he got tired from running).

Purple prose sounds like it would not imply anything, but extend the scene meaninglessly.
>lol I know this is what you were trying to say but examples are fucking shit, always

[Anonymous No.4975521]

>>4973076
It's intentionally using language that is complex for the sake of it being complex.

IE: Taking a thesaurus and scanning through your manuscript replacing words with other words that mean the same thing but are either larger/more complex for the sake of looking intelligent.

It's always shit.

[Anonymous No.4975541]

>>4973208
That's more overly-verbose than purple.

[Anonymous No.4975551]

>>4973208
Well done and exemplary.

[Anonymous No.4975555]

>>4973297

[Anonymous No.4975556]

>>4975521
"And so I elected to eschew the care-worn byways of academia's burgeoning groves and seek instead the solace of the byre, the barn, the pastoral meadow, alone to explore the rustic ruminations and isolated contemplation of the rural autodidact."

de purple it somebody?

[Anonymous No.4975588]

>>4975556
I stopped going to school and decided to hang out in the country.

[Anonymous No.4975599]

>>4975556
HAHAHAHAH nice.