the new limits of "novel" (UNCLASSIFIED)

Jonathan Lighter wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM
Tue Mar 29 12:14:28 UTC 2011


Gee, guys, it feels great to be up there with Gresham, Keynes, Hubble,
Murphy, Boyle, Ohm, Kirchhoff, Zipf, Grimm, Burke, et al. But there is a
more disturbing corollary to Lighter's Law:

"Anything broadcast by communications media will be believed and embraced by
somebody."

It seems certan that the drift of _novel_ from "book-length work of fiction"
to "book-length work of fiction or nonfiction" resulted from simple
misunderstanding enforced by continued ignorance. The hypothetical broader
meaning ("*any lengthy creative work") could have a similar trajectory.

With luck it won't, but indeed time will tell.

JL


On Mon, Mar 28, 2011 at 6:07 PM, victor steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       victor steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: the new limits of "novel" (UNCLASSIFIED)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Given my experience with journalism students, I agree completely.
>
> VS-)
>
> On Mon, Mar 28, 2011 at 6:03 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC
> <Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
> >>
> >> I don't want to think so. Surely the boundary between "fiction" and
> > "drama"
> >> is still widely recognized. It's easier to assume that somebody at CNN
> > just
> >> didn't know what he was talking about.
> >>
> >
> >
> > " It's easier to assume that somebody at [any given media or internet
> > outlet; a political office; anyplace with a microphone or keyboard] just
> > didn't know what he was talking about."
> >
> > I propose this as Lighter's Law.
> >
> > I predict it will zoom past Murphy's in importance as the years go by.
>
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>



--
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