Politics and the English language
'Politics and the English Language' is widely considered Orwell's most important essay on style. Style, for Orwell, was never simply a question of aesthetics; it was always inextricably linked to politics and to truth.'All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia.When the general atmosphere is bad, language must suffer.'Language is a political issue, and slovenly use of language and cliches make it easier for those in power to deliberately use misleading language to hide unpleasant political facts. Bad English, he believed, was a vehicle for oppressive ideology, and it is no accident that 'Politics and the English Language' was written after the close of World War II.
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- Orwell's entire essay (Politics and the English Language) is well worth reading if you haven't before:
https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...
(I'm guessing Zinsser's comments are from "On Writing Well", which you can also find online even though it is still under copyright.)
It's a bit of a pet peeve when people include quotes on a blog post without linking or otherwise references their source.
- I wish it were possible to beat Opus 5 over the head with a copy of Orwell's Politics and the English Language sometimes.
- George Orwell's essays. I love his simple, matter-of-fact prose style and I'm trying to absorb as much of it as possible to improve my own writing. Many of them are available online if you don't want a full book. "Politics and the English Language" is a must-read.
https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...
- I've been re-reading "Politics and the English Language" about once a month lately. There are so many parallels between what he saw in his era's bad modern writing and AI-assisted writing:
> As I have tried to show, modern writing at its worst does not consist in picking out words for the sake of their meaning and inventing images in order to make the meaning clearer. It consists in gumming together long strips of words which have already been set in order by someone else, and making the results presentable by sheer humbug. The attraction of this way of writing is that it is easy. It is easier – even quicker, once you have the habit ... If you use ready-made phrases, you not only don’t have to hunt about for the words; you also don’t have to bother with the rhythms of your sentences, since these phrases are generally so arranged as to be more or less euphonious ... By using stale metaphors, similes and idioms, you save much mental effort, at the cost of leaving your meaning vague, not only for your reader but for yourself ... A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus: What am I trying to say? What words will express it? What image or idiom will make it clearer? Is this image fresh enough to have an effect? And he will probably ask himself two more: Could I put it more shortly? Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly? But you are not obliged to go to all this trouble. You can shirk it by simply throwing your mind open and letting the ready-made phrases come crowding in. They will construct your sentences for you – even think your thoughts for you, to a certain extent – and at need they will perform the important service of partially concealing your meaning even from yourself.
But his "6 rules" are brilliant too. I'll look into his other essays.
- I second your recommendation of 'Politics and the English Language', it is absolutely essential reading. His prose is phenomenal. C.S. Lewis is another whose prose is a pleasure to read, with 'The Screwtape Letters' being his best IMO.
- Thanks for asking (I too am interested to hear others')
The Days Are Long but the Decades Are Short for simplification, balance and inspiration: https://blog.samaltman.com/the-days-are-long-but-the-decades...
Orwell's Politics and the English Language on the importance of precise use of language: https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...
Orwell's Why I Write on critical thinking and clear communication: https://www.telelib.com/authors/O/OrwellGeorge/essay/whyiwri...
Steve Jobs' Stanford Commencement Address (a speech rather than an essay, but worthy of quarterly viewing): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc
Oscar Wilde's A Sentimental Journey Through Literature - a disciplined but scathing repost to a critic who takes shots at Wilde's work without understanding nor appreciating it. Timeless, given how much media is poorly substantiated opinion at best, and outright emotional babble at worst: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/14240/14240-h/14240-h.htm#:~...
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