[Ads-l] "almost literally"

[Stanton McCandlish]

I hadn't previously run into this permutation of misuse of "literally" as a
generic intensifier:

https://github.com/endless-sky/endless-sky/issues/362#issuecomment-368269989

"In fact, I would go as far as to say that a hardcore mode would go a long
> ways towards bridging a major problem with [the video game] Endless Sky:
> that death and failure has almost literally no impact."


Note also the doubly redundant *-s* suffixing in "a long ways towards"
where "a long way toward" would do.  Is it even idiomatic in any dialect? I
can imagine "a long ways toward" and "a long way towards" in some of them,
but "a long ways towards" seems likes overkills.  Also caught that "go as
far as to" for "go so far as to", though maybe the former is more common
than I think. It looks weird and slangish to me, like "would/should/could
of" in place of standard "... have".  The "bridging a ... problem" mixed
metaphor is interesting, too.  Reminds me of Farberisms and Berraisms, like
"hit the nail right on the nose".

This is trivia I suppose; it's not in a professionally edited publication,
and I have no idea of the background of the writer, who might be young, or
a non-native English speaker.

--
Stanton McCandlish
McCandlish Consulting
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Oakland CA 94601-5516

+1 415 234 3992

https://www.linkedin.com/in/SMcCandlish

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