No posts here lately while I’ve been reading my way through Elizabeth Jane Howard’s brilliant 5-novel sequence The Cazalet Chronicles. I’m halfway through the final volume, and will post about them shortly. I didn’t want to comment on each one individually: thought it best to do so as a whole.
In the meantime here’s a short piece about words I’ve noted lately. Haven’t written about this kind of thing for a while, so it’ll make a change.
Polysyllablic words seem to appeal to some people when there are plainer, clearer and simpler alternatives available. Maybe they think it adds gravity or something to their message. I’ve mentioned George Orwell’s complaint about this kind of verbosity in the past.
The first one popped up in a novel I wrote about here recently: Full Fadom Five, by D. C. Bourgeois. It’s a word I had to look up:
ANADROMOUS
It refers to those fish, like salmon, that live in the sea but swim up rivers to spawn in fresh water. The derivation is from Greek ana- (up) and drom- (run – as in hippodrome, I suppose). Those creatures that are CATADROMOUS are similar, but the other way round. There’s no other way of saying this without a lengthy phrase as an alternative, so it’s a good one to know.
A couple of weeks ago I was sitting in my car, waiting for lights to change, when I noticed the truck in front of me was one of those with the big rotating drums on the back that mix and deliver cement. A notice on its rear end read:
Warning: CEMENTITIOUS MATERIAL BURNS
What a bloated word. What’s wrong with ‘cement’? To be fair, these trucks maybe transport other cement-like materials that aren’t in fact cement…
In a similar vein was a notice in the hospital I visited just before Christmas to have knee surgery. It told me that I was in the AMBULATORY CARE UNIT.
Am I alone in finding this a tad pretentious? Hairdressers and other places are happy to have notices that say ‘walk-ins welcome’. I suppose the people who commission such notices in hospitals want to seem serious and grand – and perhaps it’s not strictly accurate to say ‘walk-ins’ in this kind of clinical setting. And on reflection I’m finding it hard to think of a clearer, simpler alternative.
Now back to the marvellous E J Howard.
LOL, I have heard of ambulatory but not the other two, though I agree that walk-in is fine!!
The cement example got me thinking of others on the same lines: rockiferous substances, perhaps…
Love articles on words. Do love polysyllabic words too though, must admit. But, like you, only where necessary and unpretentious. For example, the word ‘utilize’ over ‘use’ irks me! I wonder if it’s my age?
Bex: thanks for taking the trouble to comment. I’m not averse to a bit of polysyllabic vocabulary myself, but as you say, in the right place and context. ‘Utilise’ is another of my pet hates. (‘Commence’ is another, rather than ‘start’.) BTW, I notice you use the American spelling with a ‘z’; it’s an orthographic detail that’s caused lots of controversy here over the years. Different style guides give different advice, among which is to use a ‘z’ in words with a Greek origin; not too helpful. Train announcements here in the UK usually tell passengers to take care when ‘alighting’ at the next station – surely the only context in which that term is used now (‘get off’ is presumably considered not impressive enough).