William Safire brings up a question in his “On Language” column today that I’ve stewed over in the past: “Should writers show off their erudition by deliberately using unfamiliar words on occasion?”
Despite being unable to resist a quip that “you’ll always get a few easily annoyed souls who find the use of an unfamiliar locution rebarbative,” Safire agrees that, foremost, plain words communicate best.
On the other hand, he advocates “stretching a readership’s vocabulary” if the audience is “inquisitive” (although shouldn’t any reader be assumed inquisitive?), noting that it’s easy to look up words nowadays with these computers he’s heard so much about.
He also brings up the tired writers’ trick of using a “hard word” in context or near a synonym. That works, although the latter is repetitive and unnecessary; any savvy editor would recognize it as grandstanding on the author’s part and redline it for removal.
My take: Safire’s first point is the best. Cut the wishy-washy; most of the time a writer should keep it simple for the win. See here: the best writers use common, concrete words in uncommon combinations or contexts to create beautifully memorable phrases that remain clear. That’s the best single line of advice I can think to give anyone who wants to write well.
I could go on forever with favorite examples; libraries brim with them: “Whether that mattress was stuffed with corn-cobs or broken crockery, there is no telling, but I rolled about a good deal, and could not sleep for a long time.” (Herman Melville), “...still he kept up a flow of sarcastic talk, just to exercise his wits and to have the fun of disputing” (Aesop), “Potentiality knocks on the door of my heart.” (Haruki Murakami), “The howl of clashing colors, the intertwining of all contradictions, grotesqueries, trivialities: LIFE” (Tristan Tzara) and a favorite lullaby, “Dream tonight of peacock tails/Diamond fields and spouter whales/Ills are many, blessing few,/But dreams tonight will shelter you.” (Thomas Pynchon).
And especially in light of yet more looming from that screenwriters’ strike, the classic brass nugget from 1930s studio executive Irving Thalberg: “What’s all this business about being a writer? It’s just putting one word after another.”