Language/Writing Tip 15

Want to make your writing splendidly dull? No problem. Just repeat words, preferably vague ones:

“The good thing about the novel is that it’s a good read.”

Less obviously:

“Something that we might consider is that some things are not anything special.”

For those into soap-box style rhetoric, near repetition through figura etymologica can add comedy:

“They poisoned him with poison.”

In this poisonous (ouch) example there is little doubt that the repetition is intentional. “Poison,” after all, is not a filler-word like “good” or “thing” or “dude.”

The longer your sentence, the greater the danger of unintentional repetition:

“Within the context of 21st-century considerations of how we are to configure varying and competing perspectives on the individual qua individual, it is crucial that we bear in mind the contemporary context.”

Admittedly, not many would follow that sentence to its sorry end. Still, the second “context” is grotesquely redundant.

ALL OF THE TIPS OF THE YEAR ARE AVAILABLE AT:
http://www2.arnes.si/~bjason/LW%20tips.pdf

(Skupno 21 obiskov, današnjih obiskov 1)
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