does your writing have a style

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well, what is it ?

― anthony, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

faulty-shift-button-and-punctuation-abuse chic, baby.

― petra jane, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

bad.

― jess, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

worse!

― gareth, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

magpie

― Tracer Hand, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I think my handwriting style is good.

― jel --, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

long convoluted sentences. and short clipped phrases that are not proper sentences.

and a tendency to reference phrases picked up from journalism long after anyone would spot the reference - e.g. whenever I talk about "trend people" I am using the term Norwegian Black Metallers used to describe people who liked mainstream metal, although in a broader context.

― DV, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

A mixture of smart-arsedness and affectations I've copied off others

― electric sound of jim, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes.

― JM, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

faux-naif

― N., Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

vrai-naif

― Sam, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Historicist, obsessive, impenetrable

― Robin Carmody, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Long convoluted sentences with many dashes, semi-colons and parentheses. Piled up descriptions using hyphenated words. A tendency to ramble. The last gets ironed out of essays for uni, but that's about the only variation.

― Tim, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes. It's precious and rather pompous and I don't like it much, especially when I spot similar stuff in what other people are writing, or when I read my own writing back. On the plus side it's clear and even approaches elegance sometimes. On ILX meanwhile I'm thinking aloud and I do the i) and ii) thing cause that's how I order my own thoughts.

― Tom, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

concise

― jel --, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

laboured and tedious

― David Inglesfield, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Somewhat scatty.

Although someone once described it as camp, which I couldn't really see.

― Anna, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i wish mine was more colourful, and i would like it to make less sense, if you see what i mean.

― gareth, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

the worstest.

― Todd Burns, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Colon splices. Semicolon splices. A, but B. C, and D. I hate it.

― Douglas, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Cluttered, vague, cliched, often drab, with ever-so-brief moments of clarity. Oh, and severely lacking in confidence.

But, then, I've been hanging around you talentless (WINK) jerks (WINK) for nearly 9 months; I guess that was to be expected.

And did I mention my wanton abuse of the passive voice?

― David Raposa, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I am master of the parenthetical aside (at least I am in my mind).

― Dan Perry, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

All (ahem) the rhetorical flourishes I have, I copied from Bottersnikes and Gumbles.

― Alan Trewartha, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Of course.

― Pete, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes it kind of does actually, now that I've started writing about live djs I see and dance music it seems to have a style of sorts. I'm quite proud of myself, even if I'm not doing anything with most of the stuff. I guess if I like the gig, my style tends to be enthusiastic mentalism, and I like constructing unusual analogies for some reason. I'm particularly proud of me comparing Dave Clarkes move to Skint last year to Gary McAllister signing for Liverpool.

― Ronan, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

It has *something.* What, I'm not sure.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

No.

― Arthur, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Melodramatic, histrionic, metaphors that don't quite work and italics.

― Mandee, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

P53UD0-|-|/-\X0R!57, !|\| K/-\s3 j00 h4|)|\|+ |\|0+!(3|)

― Norman Phay, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

you can tell i hate to write

― duane, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i don't know.

― di, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Too many commas, and excessively verbose sentences that go on and on and on without really making a point.

― RickyT, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

It oscillates between all over the map kooky, and text-book dreary. Undisciplined is a good word.

― Kim, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Duane - no you can't - yet another example of your unhappy success at disguising your inner torment!

― maryann, Monday, 4 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

one year passes...

Elegiac, nested lists, rangey, even, neat, earnest, light humour.

― David. (Cozen), Sunday, 10 August 2003 19:44 (twenty-two years ago)

I've gone through 'childish, flippant, flitty' into 'compact, heavy allusions, confusing' out from 'normal, heavy reliance on manipulating forms, form over content, fancy words' resting on this new simpler writing style which is a tad more mature (in the sense that it coheres) and pretty. Each of these evolutions, or almost each, have been marked by a name change.

On ilx, I think now people can understand my posts and I'm less elusive / Alain Resnais, and I'm a lot happier now when I read my posts back than when someone revives an old thread and from the murk a 'david h' or 'dwh' post fetches up and mocks me.

― David. (Cozen), Sunday, 10 August 2003 19:49 (twenty-two years ago)

(I fear though that I may have scuppered my chances of anyone actually liking my writing / giving it new, fair chance due to the drivel they've had to put up with under my fallen pseuds.)

― David. (Cozen), Sunday, 10 August 2003 19:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Mine is fairly styleless, I think. Fairly casual, and I hope it states its meanings fairly clearly, but it's pretty basic.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Sunday, 10 August 2003 20:10 (twenty-two years ago)

This thread should be 'does my writing have a style?' Other people are better equipped to tell me what my style is than I am.

― David. (Cozen), Sunday, 10 August 2003 20:12 (twenty-two years ago)

I have two modes:

1. Dead fucking serious and brutally honest (which some people mistake for condescending)

2. Ranting (which ends up as a somewhat humorous but heartfelt and honest chain of what might appear to be non-sequiters but really aren't; machine-gun effusion)

Those who know me will attest that is how I am in non-ILX life and always have been.

― Orbit (Orbit), Sunday, 10 August 2003 20:31 (twenty-two years ago)

"you can tell he's heavy metal because he advocates murder", as well as being mainly cribbed from old record reviews

― dave q, Sunday, 10 August 2003 20:41 (twenty-two years ago)

I think I've got two modes as well - 1) diplomatic/businesslike and 2) flip & full of slang..

― daria g (daria g), Monday, 11 August 2003 02:00 (twenty-two years ago)

My writing style is too heavily based upon my favorite writers. Everything I write ends up sounding like something Lorrie Moore decided to cut.

― kirsten (kirsten), Monday, 11 August 2003 02:03 (twenty-two years ago)

I write like paul morley combs his hair.

― RJG (RJG), Monday, 11 August 2003 02:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't know that it has much of a style, most of my writing on ilx in particular strikes me as artless, awkward, and ugly.

― Larcole (Nicole), Monday, 11 August 2003 02:09 (twenty-two years ago)

that's a style! a pretty good one IMO too

― duane, Monday, 11 August 2003 02:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Basically, I do everything in my power to make everything I write resemble "Idiot Boyfriend" by Jimmy Fallon.

― Ally (mlescaut), Monday, 11 August 2003 02:15 (twenty-two years ago)

wielded well, the tip of the whip can remove the ash from yr assailant's cigar while travelling faster than sound — causing the so-called "crack"

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 11 August 2003 07:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Not sure, sparse, often pre-emptive of audiences assumptions and then a bit debunking. Sometimes just straw men though, admittedly. Cynical too strong a word, deadpan maybe. Passionate obviously, when necessary. Wacky occasionally. this sounds like a singles ad

― Ronan (Ronan), Monday, 11 August 2003 08:58 (twenty-two years ago)

In German I write like Frank Miller with a hangover. Can't seem to do that in English.

― Sommermute (Wintermute), Monday, 11 August 2003 09:10 (twenty-two years ago)

I write "like a motherfucker", apparently. Which is more than fine with me.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 11 August 2003 09:21 (twenty-two years ago)

annoying, opinionated and pretentious...

― Dave Stelfox (Dave Stelfox), Monday, 11 August 2003 09:34 (twenty-two years ago)

I feel pretentious if I don't write something exactly how I would have said it, which is bad cause I'm not a good speaker.

― Dan I., Monday, 11 August 2003 09:52 (twenty-two years ago)

i love pretentiousness and irritating people, particularly when i'm being paid for it...

― Dave Stelfox (Dave Stelfox), Monday, 11 August 2003 09:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Trying to be eloquent lacking execution.

― jel -- (jel), Monday, 11 August 2003 16:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I got cat class & I got cat style.

― Tep (ktepi), Monday, 11 August 2003 16:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I think my writing is New Jack.

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Monday, 11 August 2003 16:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Like 1,000,000 monkeys on acid writing caligraphy on 3x5 note cards with crayons is how the nickalicious writes.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 11 August 2003 16:22 (twenty-two years ago)

i stand by my original assessment

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Monday, 11 August 2003 16:35 (twenty-two years ago)

As for my comment, I think now I have stopped using so many italics. The rest remains true, except add "exhausting" to the list.

― Mandee, Monday, 11 August 2003 16:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Early American Attention Deficit Disorder.

― luna (luna.c), Monday, 11 August 2003 16:49 (twenty-two years ago)

i think i rely too much on dead hooker jokes

― Kingfish (Kingfish), Monday, 11 August 2003 20:17 (twenty-two years ago)

but dead hooker jokes are funny

― luna (luna.c), Monday, 11 August 2003 20:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Nope

― Millar (Millar), Monday, 11 August 2003 20:30 (twenty-two years ago)

but dead hooker jokes are funny

i say so too, Luna, but others, specially certain people who read my Livejournal, don't think so.

it's not that i'm misogynistic or anything--the entertainment is in the STABBING of the hooker, not what gender they happen to be.

― Kingfish (Kingfish), Monday, 11 August 2003 20:34 (twenty-two years ago)

How can anyone find fault with that? Except hookers, maybe, but come on, even they have to have senses of humor.

― luna (luna.c), Monday, 11 August 2003 20:35 (twenty-two years ago)

apparently, 'real-naif'

― minna (minna), Tuesday, 12 August 2003 03:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Hmm. Well, simple, with occasional flourishes, would be how I describe mine. When I write essays for school or short stories for my hard drive, I write three or five long rambling barely-coherent sentences, then obsessively go back and chop them into little pieces so they get the point across and don't use "passive voice" and don't repeat the same word over and over. And every once in a while when I'm obsessively editing myself I discover some oddball turn of phrase that I keep in.

Oh, I've had more than one person say my short stories reminded them of Ray Bradbury (one was my 13 year old brother, the other a college professor).

― jewelly (jewelly), Tuesday, 12 August 2003 03:44 (twenty-two years ago)

my stories: boring
my poetry: rants-r-us
my haikus: sneaky

my plays are mashups,
farce with sci-fi with porno
and lots of bad songs

in my children's books
I am random yet gentle
I could use more edge

my one novel: bold,
much slangier than even
I thought I'd pull off

my reviews are all
the fuck over the place but
I see that as strength

― Haikunym (Haikunym), Tuesday, 12 August 2003 04:55 (twenty-two years ago)

desperate

― M Matos (M Matos), Tuesday, 12 August 2003 05:38 (twenty-two years ago)

pithy and rambling

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Tuesday, 12 August 2003 05:41 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.cropcircleresearch.com/articles/images/uk01dm/code.gif

― Dada, Tuesday, 12 August 2003 06:24 (twenty-two years ago)

my writing has no style, it has stylee YO!

― Tad (llamasfur), Tuesday, 12 August 2003 06:25 (twenty-two years ago)

one year passes...

I just in trouble, about my commas.

not in trouble, really. I think, she was trying to tell me that people don't like a lot (not too many). she, also, said that she is italian and sympathises, with me, but, yeah. she said I was cheeky, too.

I need to learn to write more plainly.

― RJG (RJG), Friday, 26 November 2004 11:23 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm amazed how many commas you've got away with so far.

I don't think my writing has a style so much as a clumsiness.

― Cathy (Cathy), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:06 (twenty-one years ago)

fake earnestness, self-consciousness, a tendency to adopt forms without consideration for content

― fauxhemian (fauxhemian), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:32 (twenty-one years ago)

i write like i talk, but minus the cloying folksy conversational stuff.

― stockholm cindy (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Conversational + more vocabulary - Three Stooges sound effects = William.

― I Am Curious (George) (Rock Hardy), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Clumsiness is good; writing should be like Lego.

I just made that up.

Your commas, RJG, like your method of getting home from work, are old-fashioned, yet pleasing.

Older viewers may like to know that today I received an entirely legible note from The Pinefox.

― Puddin'Head Miller (PJ Miller), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:43 (twenty-one years ago)

cheeky good, comma good. will you change?

― cºzen (Cozen), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:45 (twenty-one years ago)

my style, I guess, is seriousness.

― cºzen (Cozen), Friday, 26 November 2004 18:45 (twenty-one years ago)

forum style different from actual "proper" style
All actual published stuff specialises in huge degrees of disassociation, fractured, sentences deliberately undermined, reader deliberately brought into conspiracy versus the actual text.
Don't know. Studied disinterest, maybe? (God, I'm a wanker)

― Matt (Matt), Saturday, 27 November 2004 01:39 (twenty-one years ago)

I like Matt's description!

forum: layers of pastische/tribute to ppl who might conceivably read it (esp Mandee, Adam, Gareth)...

elsewhere: compressed and private, crammed with asmany personal associations as will fit, trying to make song out of failure to carry them to other people.

― Gravel Puzzleworth (Gregory Henry), Saturday, 27 November 2004 02:05 (twenty-one years ago)

Washed-up slangpunk.

I'm irrelevant now but I'll be back like purple rain eternal.

― LeCoq (LeCoq), Saturday, 27 November 2004 03:31 (twenty-one years ago)

like my car's engine- rattling, boy

― Morley Timmons (Donna Brown), Saturday, 27 November 2004 03:50 (twenty-one years ago)

Prattish, recherché, high-falutin’ profanity punctuated by equal doses of silliness, obscure puns, and pretentious references.

― Michael White (Hereward), Saturday, 27 November 2004 04:57 (twenty-one years ago)

six years pass...

in the september of 2011 i pledge to make a few improvements to my posting "style":

- i will stop using ", etc." at the end of sentences.
- i will significantly curtail my use of parentheses
- the use of two parenthetical remarks inside one sentence shall result in a 36-hour self-ban

i realize that other improvements should be made, but i will start with these for now.

― In the long run, we will all be cyberpunks (Z S), Sunday, 4 September 2011 16:16 (fourteen years ago)

My writing has a style, but that style has no name.

― Aimless, Sunday, 4 September 2011 19:57 (fourteen years ago)

the one consistent thing everyone who has ever edited or advised me has said is that i don't use enough commas, but funnily enough the one thing all those people had in common was that they used too many.

― the-dream in the witch house (difficult listening hour), Sunday, 4 September 2011 20:17 (fourteen years ago)

^^ that one was just right, Goldilocks.

― Anakin Ska Walker (AKA Skarth Vader) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 4 September 2011 20:29 (fourteen years ago)

hee

― the-dream in the witch house (difficult listening hour), Sunday, 4 September 2011 20:43 (fourteen years ago)

i stand by my original assessment

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Monday, August 11, 2003

― strongo hulkington's ghost dad, Sunday, 4 September 2011 20:57 (fourteen years ago)

i dont consider ilx posts writing

― Lamp, Sunday, 4 September 2011 21:02 (fourteen years ago)

i stand by my original assessment (ilx and published for-profit writing, inclusive)

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Monday, August 11, 2003

― strongo hulkington's ghost dad, Sunday, 4 September 2011 21:07 (fourteen years ago)

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