Word: jargoneers
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...book is full of De Vries' happy wordplay, metaphysical Wiffle Balls, witty oxymorons (Peachum describes himself as a "self-pitying stoic") and perversely amusing ironies (a house burns down because of faulty wiring in a smoke detector). There are also the author's ticklish ways with the jargon of three generations, throwaway lines ("A writer is Like his pencil. He must be worn down to be kept sharp"), and a dandy piece of burlesque when Peachum tries to undress Officer d'Amboise in her patrol car ("Deploying my right hand slowly downward along her waist, I tried...
...voice. It will say, for example, "You must finish, and you don't have enough time." Or "You can't do it, you're no good, and everyone will find out." In Freudian terminology, this voice would be called the superego, but Kuriloff, whose abhorrence of jargon is reassuring to a writer, calls it the Critic. One jargon term she does not use is writer's block; the images it can suggest seem to get in the way of an awareness of the Critic...
...they come: surprising new writers who have shattered the deadening conventions of the past. They have recoiled from the novel, viewing it as prefabricated Stalinist architecture. The genre of choice is the short story or novella. Many writers have managed gradually to escape from Socialist Realism, with its obligatory jargon and hortatory themes, traveling a world away -back to 19th century realism. Even Boris Pasternak and Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the two major Russian writers to produce big novels, did so in the classical manner...
...been argued that teaching needs to be more professional. But in some ways it is too professional now-too encrusted with useless requirements and too tangled in its own obscure professional jargon. The impenetrable language of educators has evolved into what Koerner calls "an artificial drive to create a profession." But it is more damaging to the country than the jargon of law, say, or even government, because it sabotages the use of clear writing and clear thinking by tens of thousands of teachers, and through them, hundreds of thousands of students...
During the 1960s and '70s the most creative and persuasive advertising poured Dout of the small, freewheeling agencies known as ad boutiques, like Carl Ally or Delia Femina, Travisano & Partners. Gucci-shod zanies in tinted glasses and with-it jargon dreamed up "the white wine that goes with any dish" for Blue Nun and Braniff's pastel-colored jets and Pucci-clad stewardesses. But these days the modest shops along Madison Avenue are once again the big agencies. Says Ed McCabe, president of the onetime boutique Scali, McCabe, Sloves "The giants are doing more good work than ever...