[Ads-l] David Foster Wallace

[Wilson Gray]

I had the misfortune to stumble across his anti-ALL OF tirade on one of the
OED blog sites. It was almost enough to make me lose my 'ligion, giving up
my belief in the near-total correctness of the OED. (My faith ceased to be
to be total when I read the ridiculously-nonsensical definition therein of
_pimp_. However, the OED's definition is based on literary sources and not
on fact, right? So, I can't really justify finding fault. Most literary
descriptions of pimps do match the OED's definition. I, before I learned
better, even conflated pimps with gigolos. youneverknow.)

On Fri, Aug 14, 2015 at 6:25 AM, Dave Wilton <dave at wilton.net> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Dave Wilton <dave at WILTON.NET>
> Subject:      Re: David Foster Wallace
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I'm loath to apply superlatives, but he's up there.
>
> His review of the first edition of Garner's Modern American Usage, =
> titled "Authority and American Usage," is positively Orwellian in how he =
> conflates the dictates of an autocrat with the "democratic spirit" and =
> his description of how you can make authoritarianism palatable simply by =
> clothing it in the right rhetorical tones. (Although, I wonder if his =
> review isn't an example of Poe's Law and if he's really dissing Garner.)
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf =
> Of Wilson Gray
> Sent: Friday, August 14, 2015 12:38 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: David Foster Wallace
>
> Is/Was? he the greatest prescriptivist of the English language?
>
> --
> -Wilson
> -----
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to =
> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -Mark Twain
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org