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  • The Elegant Variation is "Fowler’s (1926, 1965) term for the inept writer’s overstrained efforts at freshness or vividness of expression. Prose guilty of elegant variation calls attention to itself and doesn’t permit its ideas to seem naturally clear. It typically seeks fancy new words for familiar things, and it scrambles for synonyms in order to avoid at all costs repeating a word, even though repetition might be the natural, normal thing to do: The audience had a certain bovine placidity, instead of The audience was as placid as cows. Elegant variation is often the rock, and a stereotype, a cliché, or a tired metaphor the hard place between which inexperienced or foolish writers come to grief. The familiar middle ground in treating these homely topics is almost always the safest. In untrained or unrestrained hands, a thesaurus can be dangerous."
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April 06, 2004

An Elegant Variation

The post below is actually from an emaily by Helen. Helen waxes with poetry about why some people consider Barnes & Noble (as well as Borders, Books-a-Million, and, to a lesser degree, Amazon) harmful to publishing. Helen was gracious enough to allow its posting here, even as she explained it was meant as an email and, thus, was not edited. I took the liberty of shortening it a bit, but found it eminently readable. Part of what makes Helen's remarks interesting is that they come from a reader's perspective (vs. a writer's). Most wanna-be writers seem almost to take private glee in haranguing the book depots -- or despots -- over their deleterious impact on first-novel advances, chances of publication, etc. While true, these complaints smell too much like sour grapes (especially in the face of those prominently displayed First Novel signs near the entrance of every B&N). Helen's remarks, while just as biting, seem more honest because of their lack of agenda.

Helen writes:

I guess these days everyone wants instruction on what to buy; B&N recommends, tv book clubs, the ”theme tables” at B&N. Maybe people don’t want to take a chance on a new author or an old classic even at used book prices. We are risk-averse readers! Is everyone too busy to explore shelves and dig through the stacks on the floor?

Perhaps people would rather gape at the shiny pink and lavender jacket designs on the latest chick-lit book. (Have you noticed the thematic tables at B&N? They put an array of candy pink books whose covers show a disembodied leg shod in a spiky Manolo Blahnik death trap, or a cute little purse or martini glass clutched in well-manicured claws. All these glossy covers are designed to attract women to read non-threatening, fluffy, Friday night with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s prose. A pox on you Candace Bushnell! I think she used her own well-manicured claws to open the lid on a Pandora’s box of profiteering publishing trolls who are spinning with glee at the potential profit to be had on those books which are little more than Vogue/ Lucky magazines in book form. I can just picture Candy B. and her well-heeled troupe of chick-lit hacks tipping back Cosmo’s and discussing the new hotness in the shallow end of the literature pool.)

How did the disembodied stiletto heel become such a popular cover object anyway? I went to a Brentano’s yesterday (the 9th circle of bookstore hell) and counted 5 book covers depicting some type of high heeled shoe in pink or purple background. I understand the importance of cover art, but why can’t there be some art on the covers. (not to discredit the graphic artists who create these foot-fetish covers, but come on we’ve seen enough heels already) Why do I feel like I’m being targeted? It makes me want to flee, and I must admit, I’ve never read one of those chick-lit books, so maybe they are well-written and enjoyable, but they’ve never sparked my interest. My problem is not necessarily with these authors, tho I don’t think we need another book about fabulous shoes, bottle blondes, expensive purses, nanny confessions, who am I going to marry before my biological clock stops ticking, or whatever they write about. My issue is with publishers and retailers; I don’t want to be profiled and targeted and ushered like a pack animal to the appropriate table.

It’s about advertising; advertising a lifestyle, urging people to buy stuff, to buy Sex and the City fabulousness (currently the target is women but I think the Lad-lit/ Dick-lit revolution is just around the corner).

Big bookstores, while not necessarily evil, still raise my suspicion. I get the sense that they are laid-out by people who work in marketing departments, I think they arrange the books strategically to influence “purchase behavior”, and I suspect they use phrases like “point of sale”, refer to employees as “partners” (yeah right), and generally disrespect or underestimate the intelligence of their customers. I hate the atmosphere of big bookstores, the clerks, who too often might just as easily hawk over-priced chinos at Banana Republic as work at the bookstore; your general all purpose mall-employee: ready to dispense latte’s or literature as needed.

Posted by Scott Handy at 10:30 PM |

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