Verbal indigestion

I have a strange disease: verbal indigestion. When I read or hear someone use words or phrases that are contrived, hyped, an affectation, hackneyed, smarmy, politically correct, a repetition of four-letter words, or otherwise annoying, I have an acute attack of this indigestion. (Maybe it’s not so strange, maybe others have it too but don’t want anyone else to know–sort of like being HIV positive or having herpes.)

What brought on this discourse was my reading of a recent issue of the magazine Smart Money, in which I found an article on wine. The authors, a man and a woman said to have written books on the subject, got me to run for the antacid in a hurry. Their assessments of various wines did it.

The nose alone is vibrant and filled with minerals, passion fruit and kiwi...

Crisp and complex, with a tiny hint of earthy funk at the end that gives it grounding and complexity...

Crisp and refreshing, with clean, intense, grapefruit-earth-mineral tastes that just about explode with life.

The Encarta World English Dictionary gives three definitions of funk: "a type of popular music that derives from jazz, blues, and soul"; "a state of melancholy or hopeless sadness"; and "a strong unpleasant odor." So, I don’t think a wine with funk in it (especially if it were earthy), even if it were just a "tiny hint," would be to my taste. If it also had "grounding and complexity" I am pretty sure I would stay away from it. With an "unpleasant odor" I wouldn’t get near it.

I don’t know what to make of the hyphenated grapefruit-earth-mineral. (Hyphenated words are the next thing to a single word--what used to be "to-day" in the USA we have made "today," although it is still "to-day" in most other English-speaking countries.) But, I won’t try to make one word of the grapefruit thing because I am befuddled enough with it hyphenated. I know what grapefruit tastes like, but combining it with "earth," (which I would never want to taste), and then throwing in "mineral" (the only minerals I have ever tasted were yucky) would give me pause.

Knowing that the g-e-m thing is "clean" would give me some comfort, but then considering that it is "intensive" and "just explode(s) with life"–I don’t know. I think I would pass on that one.

Since wine critics are considered by some to be demigods, they can get away with such flatulent verbiage; anyone questioning their style would be looked down on as a plebeian.

And for others, like The Lord High Executioner in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Mikado, "I’ve got a little list, who never would be missed."

The politicians. They love "the American dream" and talk about "hard-working Americans" as they (the hard workers) "sit around the kitchen table" doing whatever–like wondering how these guys ever got elected to office. And they can’t resist "the fact of the matter" (since the matter being discussed is clearly known, just "the fact" would do fine).

Or those who picked up "this point in time" from Senator Herman Talmadge of Georgia during the Watergate hearings in the U.S. Senate during the 1970's. Senator Talmadge spoke with the speed at which one travels on the Capital Beltway during rush hour, so getting out just "this time" took long enough but including the two additional words made it seem like forever. Of course, "this point in time" has been taken over by many people other than senators, but I believe it was Mr. Talmadge who got it started.

The writers, speakers, and just everyday people who get hooked on the latest trendy words and phrases like "roll out" (for the introduction of a product or service by a company), "platform" (for the basis of a business operation), "ramp up," and "tipping point."

Sure, I know language is an evolving thing; if it weren’t we would be speaking the Old English of Beowulf: "Þæt we hine swa godne gretan moton" ("that we might be allowed to address him, he who is so good") or the Middle English of Chaucer: "Ther been ful goode wyves many oon" ("There are very good wives, many a one.") from "The Miller’s Tale" in The Canterbury Tales.

Sure, I also know that I use words and phrases that were new not so long ago but are now in everyday use, like "rip off," "screw up,"and "cool." So I guess it is like food and drink: some things give one indigestion while, for others, they are a pleasant repast.

Those who use affectations in their speech or writing. An example of this is the editor of The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes, a very fine work published in 2005 (the "new" in its name distinguishes it from The Annotated Sherlock Holmes, by William Baring-Gould, published in 1967). The editor of this new version was born in Chicago and is now a lawyer in Los Angeles; as far as I am aware, he has never lived outside of the USA. Yet in his writing he uses British spelling when it is different from American: colour, favour, defence, licence, and many others. Apparently, due to his subject, he is trying to put his readers, wherever they live, in a jolly British frame of mind. To me, it seems an affectation.

I, too, used British spelling when, during the 1980's and 1990's, I wrote as a correspondent for a London-based publisher of insurance industry newsletters. London is the insurance center of the world, so the majority of readers of those newsletters were accustomed to British English; therefore, I felt it proper to adhere to that spelling (otherwise, my editor would probably have done it for me). However, when I wrote my book Insurance in the United States: A Handbook for Professionals, which was published in 1993 by that same publisher (and later published and marketed by Lloyd’s of London Press, who acquired my original publisher in 1995), I used American spelling, and had no problem with my editor about it.

Please excuse me, I have to go and take some more antacid.