The semantics of fraught prose

Read the following snippet of film criticism by Stephanie Zacharek --

Anderson's movies -- the static, stilted "The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou," the eccentric-family quirkfest "The Royal Tenenbaums" -- have always left me cold. I remain unmoved even by the aggressively fey charms of "Rushmore." "The Darjeeling Limited" -- which opens the New York Film Festival this evening, and opens elsewhere beginning tomorrow -- is the first of Anderson's movies that has elicited even the mildest scrap of affection from me: I feel warmly toward it, although I reserve the right to remain wary of its aging-hipster gimcrackery. It's as if Anderson, yesterday's next big thing, heard the homemade coffee-can drumbeat of new young DIY filmmakers like Andrew Bujalski and Joe Swanberg and realized that what the kids are into these days is shambling, sincere naturalism; his stock in trade, whimsical, deadpan irony, all meticulously orchestrated from the master control center of his brain, is starting to seem as outmoded as an old Mantovani record. Better inject some juice, and attempt at least an approximation of spontaneity, fast.

In the first sentence, see how the author qualifies "The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou" with the adjectives 'static' and 'stilted'. Now read the next section of the same sentence, where "The Royal Tenenbaums" is qualified by 'eccentric-family' and 'quirkfest'. A cursory scan of the remainder of the paragraph reveals a similar pattern, that of placing at least two adjectives before every noun -- she speaks of the "aggressively fey charms of "Rushmore"", of the director exhibiting an "aging hipster gimcrackery", of "new young DIY" filmmakers, and so on unceasingly.

Adjectives have an important role to play in any piece of prose, but that role is a supporting one . You can't just go on and sprinkle adjectives before each noun in the hope that you will sound smarter, or pithier -- it doesn't work that way. Let me take an(other) example to show you what I mean --

Before --

The chair reposed in the corner by the fireplace.

After --

The chair, whose wooden legs gave off a grim, suffocating smell of nascent varnish and whose seat, with its abbreviated edges and too-small base, seemed to invite only the most elliptical of posteriors, reposed smugly by the flickering fireplace, as if cocked in wait for its next unsuspecting occupant.

See what I mean? By inserting an arbitrary number of adjectives before each noun, my prose achieves a garishness it previously did not have. More importantly (and worryingly, at least for me), its meaning is hidden. What do I want to say here? Do I really need to describe the chair reposing by the fireplace in such excruciating detail? Does my description even 'work'? (The answer, of course, is that it does not).

I think such prose stems from authorial self-consciousness, when the writer degenerates from a person who wants to tell the truth to a person who wants to sound intelligent. There are two stages that accompany such a degeneracy. First, the writer scans his piece of writing (an article, say) looking to improve it in some abstract way. He doesn't yet know how, only that he must. When a perfunctory perusal reveals no means by which he can accomplish such an improvement, the writer grows a little anxious. This is the time of his greatest peril. If the author can somehow recognize the clouds of self-consciousness asserting themselves in the otherwise clear sky of his mind (see how fraught that sentence was?), perhaps he can avert disaster. If he cannot, though, he begins to see -- and take -- the easy way out, interposing himself, as he does, between the reader and his prose.

What is the easy way out? Why, to use adjectives, of course. Let's see. I can use the word 'static' to describe "The Life Aquatic by Steve Zissou". What else, what else. I need one more adjective, something that will convey my erudition while still being condescending. I got it! 'Stilted'! And the beauty of the thing is, when I write "the static, stilted "The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou,", I will have an alliteration! What a great writer I must be! Now let's do the same thing with the rest of the article.

And so you have the beginning of the end. For the benefit of Stephanie Zacharek and others (including myself), let me say this -- no piece of writing, however small, can be improved just by inserting an arbitrary number of adjectives/adverbs as qualifiers. There are no exceptions to this rule.

Read the entire article, if you want to.

Art and how it emerges

In this post I will discuss the reasons for the barrenness of this blog.

First of all -- I have finally begun my second book. Yes, it's true -- after many false starts and self-conscious stutters, Expatriate has finally taken off. It has an abiding theme, a main character who is unlike me in as many ways as she can possibly be (this is not to say that she is my opposite -- that would perhaps be too easy), and at least one subplot that supplements a main one. So far I've written about seven thousand words, and the characters are -- after much prompting on my part-- finally coming alive.

In the course of writing (what little I have of) Expatriate, I've discovered
something fundamental about art in general and writing in particular. Now I'm typically quite cautious while suggesting theories that seek to generalize -- if the past few years have taught me anything, it is that there are no absolutes that anyone can establish, and that everything is subject to a personal interpretation. What I'm about to say, therefore, also falls into this category, and should be regarded as such.

The observation is this -- self-consciousness leads eventually to self-expression. If art is about the observation of truths that lie within, then egotism and hubris are its necessary precursors.

By way of example, let us examine Orkut, a popular social network (at least in India). Orkut allows its members -- who are typically in the 15-30 age group -- to communicate with each other in various different ways, including scrapping (a 'scrap' is just a small asynchronous chat message) & sending email. Each user has his own page, where he can highlight his uniqueness by means of specifying various attributes; at the very bottom of this page is a space devoted to 'testimonials', which are just small paragraphs of praise and (loving) scorn authored by his friends.

Let us examine the various ways in which this particular model emphasizes the self. There is the main body of the user page, of course, which helpfully consists of an 'About Me' section. This section is probably the most popular one, and the one most likely to be full on a random user page. People love talking about themselves, and when they're provided with a forum to do so, they find they have so much to say that they cannot stop. One good thing about this section is that it inspires even the most inarticulate to write, and in so doing at least some of them discover the joys of writing (what they discover is actually the joy of self-expression, but more on that later).

After the 'about me' section comes a whole lot of other personal information, including ethnicity, religion, hometown, blog page, favorite books, movies, cuisine, and so on. These sections are also exploited by most users in ways that attempt to highlight their uniqueness. For example, a random user reveals the following about his movie preferences --

Ny thing worth watching with a strong storyline.All of Kamal movies.Art and crossover kinda stuff. MANI RATNAM movies a definite in my must watch list

Instead of simply enlisting all his favorite movies (note that 'he' is used as a universal pronoun, and is not indicative of person's gender), he uses the opportunity to say something more, something that tightens the social box around him.

Finally, there is the testimonial. Testimonials are a way of affirming your friend's individuality as well as his ability to function in society.

Here is an example from another user's page --

MY BEAST FRIEND i mean BEST FRIEND. --- is a cool cat.
--- is my childhood friend and boy we had a great childhood. the only thing that annyos me abt --- is that -- pulls my cheek's really badly.well for a friend like that sab kuch maf hai. --- is a trust worthy person and a lovely human being (dont take the human part too seriously i still doubt it myself)

well --- its been a pleasure knowing u and i know that u r going to say the samething abt me

Testimonials have an important role to play in self-discovery. Think about it -- would your best friend, in any social situation, tell you that you are a lovely human being? Or tell you how awesome you are? Obviously not. What these testimonials do is affirm your position in a person's heart and therefore also in the world. Given that our lives are a dichotomy of obstinate self-sufficiency and the solicitation of approval, there is no better thing that to know that one's friends are unconditionally supportive. This support, at the very least, encourages one to explore oneself.

However, before the purity of self-discovery comes the bully-like cowardliness of self-consciousness (note that I am assigning imaginary aesthetic attributes to aspects of human nature; this should not be taken as evidence of an attempt to establish a moral high-ground. Think of it instead as a metaphorical digression to make a point.). Before an average orkut user can discover himself, he first has to go through a phase where he places himself on a pedestal. Distracted by all these various affirmations of his individuality, he takes the easier path, which is one fraught with ego-clashes and judgmental behavior and dismissive attitudes. In this phase, the user is the king of all he surveys. The people in his life are assigned roles that they will always play in his mind, regardless of how the people themselves might change. For example, a friend could be privately labeled an idiot, and no matter how much that friend may display evidence as to the contrary, the label remains incontrovertible.

This phase stays as long as it has to, but in the end the person himself has control over when it leaves. The key to the abandonment of such an attitude is the realization that his character judgments are flawed. None of us, unfortunately, possess so little uniqueness that we can be pigeonholed so glibly. And this ultimately rescues us, because we realize simultaneously that we are special, and that we are not -- that is to say, everyone else is at least as special as we are.

Once this disillusionment sets in, two things can happen. The easier path, of course, is the same obstinate approach to life that was discussed earlier, where everything is reduced to an sound-bite-like faux simplicity. However, if one is alert enough, a transformation begins to occur. A person begins to ask himself about himself; he begins to explore what he is truly about. What 'gets' him? What fills him with dread? What awakens him? What does he feel? What is he?

These questions surface inexorably, once encouraged. No longer does he abide superficiality; no longer does he sleepwalk through the day. Also endemic to this phase is an enveloping sadness about everything, because nothing (and no one) is as simple as he once thought it was. All aspects of his life demand reinterpretations that are themselves subject to change. This phase of grieving is apparently called existential angst, though please do not quote me on that (my knowledge of philosophy is restricted to the argot of the average urbanite). The grief is augmented by an acceptance of the mutability of absolutes and the reluctant abandonment of judgment. Because everything is as alive as you are, it has to be subject to the same partial treatment that you give yourself. This phase is hard to deal with, at least initially, because the notion of superiority of the self pervades all walks of your life.

I think most people who reach this phase never escape from it, at least not fully. To exist in a society such as ours we need to preserve some notion of our own magnificence. We need to know that we are good, and that no one better than us can change that fact. At the same time, we know that there is probably no such thing as 'good', at least not in the way that we imagine it. Perhaps it was this cruel conflict that inspired Henry David Thoreau to mark that all men led lives of quiet desperation.

But the good thing about this phase is that we also find an urge to express ourselves in whatever way we possibly can. It is our consolation, in this big bad world, that we are all possessed of a right-hemisphere that allows us to think, for lack of a better word, creatively. And it is an even bigger consolation that we are given (some would say by God), all these appendages, these arms, these feet, to lend form and structure to this creativity. And so we 'create'. If you want to label these creations, you might as well call them art. I know I do.

Well, this post started off being a bullet-point like enlistment of my various activities this past month, and has evolved into something else entirely. It's heartening to know that I can write even though I haven't been reading much (this past month I've only read a single book, and a small one at that), but on the other hand I don't think I would be of much use writing topical articles like the ones you see in newspapers or magazines. Maybe if I restricted myself to only popular topics like the war in Iraq things might go a little better. Let's see.