The Slow Death of Elegant English

by Jeffrey Dale Starr

Let me begin by making one thing clear: I have no problem with slang, idioms or colloquialisms.

In fact, I think they can be quite fun and expressive. I have always had a soft spot for the jazzy banter of the Rat Pack - calling someone a "cat", "all that jazz", "chick", etc. And don't even get me started about the Joys of Yiddish.



But the other night when I was reading "Sanctuary" by William Faulkner, it really struck me that a certain kind of poetic English is slowly disappearing.

The passage that had such an effect on me was describing an accused killer as he waited in his jail cell for his punishment to be administered:


The last trumpet-shaped bloom had fallen from the heaven tree at the corner of the jail yard. They lay thick, viscid underfoot, sweet and oversweet in the nostrils with a sweetness surfeitive and moribund, and at night now the ragged shadow of full-fledged leaves pulsed upon the barred window in shabby rise and fall.


How could any lover of language not be enraptured with such gorgeous, elegant prose?

I think I could read that paragraph for the next decade and still discover things to love - "thick, viscid underfoot", "sweet and oversweet", "ragged shadow", "shabby rise and fall". On and on.

And those are two sentences from a 300+ page novel.

Also, with Faulkner you get the sense that he's not showing off - he's not stretching to try to sound erudite. It was simply who he was. This is how the man thought and spoke in everyday life.

This is the sort of elegant English that I think is dying.

And I believe that Pop Culture, to a large extent, is to blame.

As I said in the outset, I don't mind everyday speech being peppered with slang. Language is alive and has been evolving since the beginning of time.

But these days it seems like the form of language taking root is lazier...less structured. If you eavesdrop in on a conversation between two individuals who only communicate via PopSpeak, you'll notice that the interchange doesn't involve any work. In the Faulkner quote above, admittedly it takes some real brainpower and analysis to appreciate what is being said. And that mental stimulation will encourage future lovely speech from the participants and listeners.

In PopSpeak, however, everyday speech becomes very mundane.

"Did you try that new restaurant?"

"Yeah, it was good."

"What did you like about it?"

"I dunno...everything I guess."

This is the kind of unimaginative, stale conversation that has taken hold of the world. If you think about it, this simple interchange offered all kinds of opportunities to be creative, expressive, interesting, passionate (who of us doesn't have strong feelings about food in general and restaurants in particular?)

I also think texting is a contributing factor.

Again, I have no problem with abbreviations and brevity.

But a generation is being raised speaking only in OMGs and TTYLs and ROTFLs.

Like all muscles, when your creative speech center is not challenged it will atrophy, break down and disappear. I fear this is happening before our eyes (and ears).

I do declare.

---

Jeffrey Dale Starr is a Dallas-based Impressionist oil painter who concentrates on themes of Japan, Dreams, Europe, Texas and California. His work can be found in private and public collections around the world.

http://www.jeffreydalestarr.com/