« McEwan's pebbles back on beach | UK news | The Guardian | トップページ | Film Legend Charlton Heston Dead at 83 - washingtonpost.com »

2008年4月 1日 (火)

Seven Deadly Words of Book Reviewing - Paper Cuts - Books - New York Times Blog

リンク: Seven Deadly Words of Book Reviewing - Paper Cuts - Books - New York Times Blog.

Like all professions book reviewing has a lingo. Out of laziness, haste or a misguided effort to sound “literary,” reviewers use some words with startling predictability. Each of these seven entries is a perfectly good word (well, maybe not eschew), but they crop up in book reviews with wearying regularity. To little avail, admonitions abound. “The best critics,” Follett writes, “are those who use the plainest words and who make their taste rational by describing actions rather than by reporting or imputing feelings.” Now, the list: