Some Misused Words.
T OWELL, in the introduction to the second series of his Biglow Papers, has a list of what he calls the old and the new styles of newspaper writing, from which Professor Otto Jespersen has selected the following samples;— A great crowd came to fee (a vast concourse was assembled to witness). Great fire (disastrous conflagration). The fire spread (the conflagration extended its devastating career). Man fell (individual was precipitated). Sent for the doctor (called into requisition the services of the family physician). Began his answer (commenced his rejoinder) . He died (he deceased, he passed out of existence, his spirit quitted its earthly habitation, winged its way to eternity, shook off its burden, etc.). Jespersen says that “no other language lends itself by its very structure to such vile stylistic tricks as English does,” and he regards the influence of the classical languages as something between a hindrance and a help. TOUCHSTONE.
Permanent link to this item
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/TS19321008.2.48
Bibliographic details
Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 579, 8 October 1932, Page 8
Word Count
155Some Misused Words. Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 579, 8 October 1932, Page 8
Using This Item
Star Media Company Ltd is the copyright owner for the Star (Christchurch). You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Star Media. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.
Log in