REALLY, Now!

[Doug Harris]

Whoops!
I shoulda oughta googled just 'realer', not realer+definition.
SAT ('sorry about that.)
dh

At 4:03 PM -0500 2/22/08, Doug Harris wrote:
>from a NYT book review I just received:
>
>Steven Millhauser doesn't traffic in emotional upheaval or interpersonal
>conflict. He flattens his characters, giving his books the paradoxical
>effect of seeming realer than reality.
>
>Not that it's relevant, but the book is 'Dangerous Laughter'
>By STEVEN MILLHAUSER
>Reviewed by D.T. MAX
>
>I guess that, in context, 'realer' works, though a google reveals no
>evidence it's really a word.

Um, how about 20,500 hits for "realer than real" alone.  Or over 3
million hits for "realer".  What exactly do you take be google-based
"evidence that it's really a word"?  A threshold of 4 million?

>  I consider the coinage, if that's what
>this is, as dumber than dumb.
>
OK, thanks for your opinion.  Typically, a comparative of this kind
would require a context in which "real" can be taken as a matter of
degree, but if something can be deader (753,000 hits) than something
else, something can certainly be realer than something else.  But if
you don't like it, don't use it; I'm sure the language will survive
either way.

LH

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