Words and Meaning

Bradley Armstrong
October 26, 2009
Professor Christy Vance
Words and Meaning
Frequently during AP English courses in high school, I read passages authored by some of the world’s best known and most highly esteemed writers and failed to grasp by which scale they were deemed great. Many of the pieces which we studied employed the use of far too many syllables to say little or nothing at all. The inspiration for these pieces seems to be derived from an arrogant desire to display one’s ability to write at a plane above that which we mortals are capable, and not merely at an educated, intelligent level designed to raise up the reader together with the literature. Those subjected to such thought-stifling compositions are left confused and uninspired. The objective of such writing is selfish and ought to be left within the confines of the author’s own mind.
Orwell’s essay left me feeling a bit too gratified in my frustrated analysis. After reading the examples included in his essay, the same feelings of bewilderment that I had experienced during high school English returned with a vengeance. In all honestly, I expected that Orwell would suggest several ways to improve the passage, while qualifying his critique with some sort of praise or approval. I prepared myself for that familiar feeling of incompetence. However, I was quite surprised when I found that Orwell’s assessment of those passages agreed completely with my own. I found myself making a silent and private oath that my writing would never be so priggish as to merit such an evaluation.
I found his ideas for good writing refreshing and helpful. His suggestion, “If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out,” is particularly demanding. If every piece of writing were dissected in this way, only the most meaningful words and phrases would be left to communicate the writer’s intention. This would remove the option to fill space with a lot of literary fluff and require explicit explanation of each purpose.