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/sci/ - Science & Math

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11823584 No.11823584 [Reply] [Original]

How to increase my literary prowess? By that, I mean the ability to understand complex, nested sentences.
For the past 5 or so years, whenever I was talking to myself in my head, I pretended that I'm explaining the topic at hand to someone dumber and with time, my ability to understand complex sentences has declined. I mean I still can do it, just a bit slower. But what I've become more scared about is not understanding others, but expressing myself. I have tendency to break down the concept I have in mind in simpler terms, because I assume that the other person wouldn't understand otherwise. So it's maybe clear, but inefficient and frankly annoying. It's like using multiple tools one by one, instead of using a specific tool made for this very task and I don't like other people talking to me like I do, because I feel like a child or a retard. But I myself explain stuff to others in this way.
It's not about talking too long, because I make sure to look at the other person's feedback and adjust what I wanna say to their knowledge, but what's bugging me the most is a 'common' way of speech that I have. It's logical, but not profound.
Recently I started paying more attention to rarer words and trying to actively use them, because they're often more precise than something more common, but what else could I do? English is my second language, but I noticed that my grammar itself is really plain. I don't see other people using Past Perfect or some shit like that often, but somehow the flow of an average English speaker's sentences is better than mine. I feel kind of 'locked' in my writing habits and I often end up using the same patterns. How to break out of that? Should I read more? I'm able to communicate whatever I want, just not in the way I want. That is also true for my native language.

>> No.11823613
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11823613

>>11823584
By reading this.

>> No.11823960

>>11823584
Not an expert, but my guess it that you should just read more literature. I've found that after reading good authors I kind of pick up a bit their cadence. You start to automatically work that stuff into your everyday speech

>> No.11824203

>>11823584
I'll skip the obvious method of reading and writing, to offer something more interesting: Study grammar, not English grammar, but in general. Try a variety of distant languages. Engineered ones are gems for this. If you fancy, you can make your own too.
Please note that this advice is based mostly on my own speculation, not experimental data.

>> No.11824258

>>11823584
>How to increase my literary prowess? By that, I mean the ability to understand complex, nested sentences.
For the past 5 or so years, whenever I was talking to myself in my head, I pretended that I'm explaining the topic at hand to someone dumber and with time, my ability to understand complex sentences has declined. I mean I still can do it, just a bit slower. But what I've become more scared about is not understanding others, but expressing myself. I have tendency to break down the concept I have in mind in simpler terms, because I assume that the other person wouldn't understand otherwise. So it's maybe clear, but inefficient and frankly annoying. It's like using multiple tools one by one, instead of using a specific tool made for this very task and I don't like other people talking to me like I do, because I feel like a child or a retard. But I myself explain stuff to others in this way.
It's not about talking too long, because I make sure to look at the other person's feedback and adjust what I wanna say to their knowledge, but what's bugging me the most is a 'common' way of speech that I have. It's logical, but not profound.
Recently I started paying more attention to rarer words and trying to actively use them, because they're often more precise than something more common, but what else could I do? English is my second language, but I noticed that my grammar itself is really plain. I don't see other people using Past Perfect or some shit like that often, but somehow the flow of an average English speaker's sentences is better than mine. I feel kind of 'locked' in my writing habits and I often end up using the same patterns. How to break out of that? Should I read more? I'm able to communicate whatever I want, just not in the way I want. That is also true for my native language.
>>11823960
>I kind of pick up a bit their cadence
>>11824203

>> No.11824279

>>11823584
Learn English.

>> No.11824294

read David foster Wallace