4 ms·

I can't wait to eliminate from my writing such pesky, "tell not show" adverbs as the following: today, tomorrow, yesterday, soon, then, now, once/twice/thrice/

by kenko 12y ago

I can't wait to eliminate from my writing such pesky, "tell not show" adverbs as the following: today, tomorrow, yesterday, soon, then, now, once/twice/thrice/n times, there, here, hence, home (in constructions like "I took him home"), etc. Honestly, they do nothing.

thaumaturgy 12y ago
The programmer mentality: any suggested guideline must immediately fit all possible test cases or it is wrong.
- kenko 12y ago
  Locative and temporal adverbs are a very large, very useful class of adverbs. I admit that the author does mention adverbs ending in "-ly" as being particularly troublesome, but she doesn't say why just those are so bad. I assert: the mentality I exhibit in this thread is actually (!!!) that of someone who's read far too many ignorant, knee-jerk justifications of ill-thought-out (!!!) "rules" formulated and propagated by people who just don't know what they're talking about. As I said in a different comment, she even admits that she'd never really thought about the reasons behind the rule she so happily promulgates, and when asked about it she didn't even wonder, well, ARE adverbs so bad? No, she just ginned up some examples of bad writing that also employs adverbs.
  - kenko 12y ago
    I mean, I could just as easily have come to the conclusion that nouns and adjectives deserve close scrutiny with the following examples: Nancy yelled to express the anger she felt whenever someone questioned her. It's hilarious, incidentally, that she contrasts the adverb-involving sentence "Nancy yelled angrily ..." with a much fuller scene of several sentences containing dialogue between two characters. Big surprise that there are significant differences there. "Well, I guess if you had grown up with it, you would understand polo", Minx said. Minx was a snob. A dumping ground for what? Let me give you a hint, she replied as she doted on her wife. Did you get it yet, he responded, showing his zeal. ... looking at the article again, I think support for the contention that she doesn't know what she's talking about can be found in her description of "thanks so much" as involving an adverb that modifies an adjective.
  - rmrfrmrf 12y ago
    'Yesterday, Jane and Jimmy walked home.' You are literally adding fuel to the prescriptivist fire. Locative and temporal adverbs are (rightfully) banned from formal and news writing because they're useless or redundant at best and misleading at worst ('Yesterday, August 7, 2014, an unidentified driver crashed into a family of five heading home.' vs. 'August 7, 2014: an unidentified driver crashed into a family of five at the intersection of Main St and Governor Blvd in Albany, NY.'). In creative works, there's more lenience, but it's usually due to a character being the narrator or informal dialogue. IMO people should use adverbs as literary scaffolding to get a thought down before later expanding on it (if expansion by the author is even necessary).
    - kenko 12y ago
      Yes, if you're giving the actual date, the relative time from the time of utterance is redundant, and if you aren't, it's misleading because you can't make sense of it without knowing the date of utterance. I don't have access to e.g. the AP or NYT style guides but I'll believe you that they ban temporal adverbs (which strikes me as excessive zeal; really, you can't say "earlier"?); I'm not sure why you think this is significant, since those guides are formulated with specific kinds of writing in mind, and the author is talking about fiction, in which it's totally ok to just say that something happened yesterday. And, of course, different institutions can have all sorts of crazy, hard-to-justify crap in their style guides---why not---house style can be idiosyncratic. The linked author is attempting to make a case to others; she isn't saying "here's how I do it" and she isn't representing a house style. ETA in a quick search I was unable to find anything about temporal adverbs in particular in the Chicago Manual of Style.
- sp332 12y ago
  Isn't that the attitude that the author was taking? Adverbs are bad, even if you don't remember why, just apply the rule!
kazinator 12y ago
"Rotate the bomb's dial three clicks clockwise or counter-clockwise?" "Can't tell you; words ending in -wise are adjectives!"
arjie 12y ago
All very well to clown around, but here's what the article (literally) says: > Good writers go back and consider each adverb to make sure it's needed.
- kenko 12y ago
  It's risible to single adverbs out for this treatment.

by kenko 12y ago

thaumaturgy 12y ago

The programmer mentality: any suggested guideline must immediately fit all possible test cases or it is wrong.

kenko 12y ago
Locative and temporal adverbs are a very large, very useful class of adverbs. I admit that the author does mention adverbs ending in "-ly" as being particularly troublesome, but she doesn't say why just those are so bad. I assert: the mentality I exhibit in this thread is actually (!!!) that of someone who's read far too many ignorant, knee-jerk justifications of ill-thought-out (!!!) "rules" formulated and propagated by people who just don't know what they're talking about. As I said in a different comment, she even admits that she'd never really thought about the reasons behind the rule she so happily promulgates, and when asked about it she didn't even wonder, well, ARE adverbs so bad? No, she just ginned up some examples of bad writing that also employs adverbs.
- kenko 12y ago
  I mean, I could just as easily have come to the conclusion that nouns and adjectives deserve close scrutiny with the following examples: Nancy yelled to express the anger she felt whenever someone questioned her. It's hilarious, incidentally, that she contrasts the adverb-involving sentence "Nancy yelled angrily ..." with a much fuller scene of several sentences containing dialogue between two characters. Big surprise that there are significant differences there. "Well, I guess if you had grown up with it, you would understand polo", Minx said. Minx was a snob. A dumping ground for what? Let me give you a hint, she replied as she doted on her wife. Did you get it yet, he responded, showing his zeal. ... looking at the article again, I think support for the contention that she doesn't know what she's talking about can be found in her description of "thanks so much" as involving an adverb that modifies an adjective.
- rmrfrmrf 12y ago
  'Yesterday, Jane and Jimmy walked home.' You are literally adding fuel to the prescriptivist fire. Locative and temporal adverbs are (rightfully) banned from formal and news writing because they're useless or redundant at best and misleading at worst ('Yesterday, August 7, 2014, an unidentified driver crashed into a family of five heading home.' vs. 'August 7, 2014: an unidentified driver crashed into a family of five at the intersection of Main St and Governor Blvd in Albany, NY.'). In creative works, there's more lenience, but it's usually due to a character being the narrator or informal dialogue. IMO people should use adverbs as literary scaffolding to get a thought down before later expanding on it (if expansion by the author is even necessary).
  - kenko 12y ago
    Yes, if you're giving the actual date, the relative time from the time of utterance is redundant, and if you aren't, it's misleading because you can't make sense of it without knowing the date of utterance. I don't have access to e.g. the AP or NYT style guides but I'll believe you that they ban temporal adverbs (which strikes me as excessive zeal; really, you can't say "earlier"?); I'm not sure why you think this is significant, since those guides are formulated with specific kinds of writing in mind, and the author is talking about fiction, in which it's totally ok to just say that something happened yesterday. And, of course, different institutions can have all sorts of crazy, hard-to-justify crap in their style guides---why not---house style can be idiosyncratic. The linked author is attempting to make a case to others; she isn't saying "here's how I do it" and she isn't representing a house style. ETA in a quick search I was unable to find anything about temporal adverbs in particular in the Chicago Manual of Style.
sp332 12y ago
Isn't that the attitude that the author was taking? Adverbs are bad, even if you don't remember why, just apply the rule!

kazinator 12y ago

"Rotate the bomb's dial three clicks clockwise or counter-clockwise?" "Can't tell you; words ending in -wise are adjectives!"

arjie 12y ago

All very well to clown around, but here's what the article (literally) says: > Good writers go back and consider each adverb to make sure it's needed.

kenko 12y ago
It's risible to single adverbs out for this treatment.