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But I submit to you that it is not communication, since the purpose of communication is to inform, not to obfuscate.
I submit to you that you are taking it way too seriously, since the passage in question was designed to amuse, nothing more.
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Have to say I'm with Ted on this one. An example such as the above (the Douglas Adams one, I mean) is fine, for me, to look at. But reading, and trying to decode/decipher/relate an entire book or even chapter is w-a-y more trouble than I want to go to, thanks.
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Have to say I'm with Ted on this one. An example such as the above (the Douglas Adams one, I mean) is fine, for me, to look at. But reading, and trying to decode/decipher/relate an entire book or even chapter is w-a-y more trouble than I want to go to, thanks.
Perhaps for the humour-deprived (at least two of whom have seen fit to respond so far), I should have included the next bit of the book. That may have made clear that what Adams wrote was, what do you call it, oh yes, that's it, A JOKE!!
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Zaphod took a moment or two to find his way through this
labyrinthine string of negatives and emerged at the other end
with surprise.
I will also repeat my inital reason for posting the Adams quote. It was to show the influence of Carroll on Adams writing. Both used the ridiculously elaborate sentence structures to entertain. Apparently, their intent seems to have been lost on some readers.
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I will also repeat my inital reason for posting the Adams quote. It was to show the influence of Carroll on Adams writing. Both used the ridiculously elaborate sentence structures to entertain. Apparently, their intent seems to have been lost on some readers.
Choir: amen!
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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That young girl," he added unexpectedly, "is one of the least benightedly unintelligent life forms it has been my profound lack of pleasure not to be able to avoid meeting."
Please correct me if I am an imbecile, but, doesn't this just mean: "She is the least stupid young girl I have had the displeasure of meeting"? That's not that obfusatory, is it? Just a kind of damnation with the faintest imaginable praise. It reminds me of a word introduced to this board not so long ago:
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charientism noun. in rhetoric. , a charientism is a figure wherein a taunting expression is softened by a jest; an insult veiled in grace; the Greeks called it charientismus.
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Quote:
That young girl," he added unexpectedly, "is one of the least benightedly unintelligent life forms it has been my profound lack of pleasure not to be able to avoid meeting."
Please correct me if I am an imbecile, but, doesn't this just mean: "She is the least stupid young girl I have had the displeasure of meeting"? That's not that obfusatory, is it? Just a kind of damnation with the faintest imaginable praise.
The character in question was utterly incapable of uttering any complimentary remarks about anyone or anything. This was as close as he could come.
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>The character in question was utterly incapable of uttering any complimentary remarks about anyone or anything. This was as close as he could come.
Ah, then it all makes sense.
Now what about this:
"Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise."
:/
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Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
That young girl," he added unexpectedly, "is one of the least benightedly unintelligent life forms it has been my profound lack of pleasure not to be able to avoid meeting."
Please correct me if I am an imbecile, but, doesn't this just mean: "She is the least stupid young girl I have had the displeasure of meeting"? That's not that obfusatory, is it? Just a kind of damnation with the faintest imaginable praise.
The character in question was utterly incapable of uttering any complimentary remarks about anyone or anything. This was as close as he could come.
It's one thing to understand the sentence while reading it. Understanding it while having it fly by one's ears is quite different.
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Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
That young girl," he added unexpectedly, "is one of the least benightedly unintelligent life forms it has been my profound lack of pleasure not to be able to avoid meeting."
Please correct me if I am an imbecile, but, doesn't this just mean: "She is the least stupid young girl I have had the displeasure of meeting"? That's not that obfusatory, is it? Just a kind of damnation with the faintest imaginable praise.
The character in question was utterly incapable of uttering any complimentary remarks about anyone or anything. This was as close as he could come.
It's one thing to understand the sentence while reading it. Understanding it while having it fly by one's ears is quite different.
That was the real skill of Adams' writing, though. The books were quite different from the radio series. I have the entire series of both, and am as sure as I can be that the above paragraph from the book is NOT in the radio series. The scripts for the radio series were designed to be as funny to listen to as the books were to read, but they were certainly not identical. There are many instances where my eager expectation of hearing some favourite lines from the books was disappointed. Also now I find myself remembering a certain line, and scouring my books for them, only to realise that they must have been from the radio series.
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I will also repeat my inital reason for posting the Adams quote. It was to show the influence of Carroll on Adams writing. Both used the ridiculously elaborate sentence structures to entertain. Apparently, their intent seems to have been lost on some readers. This point was clear to me from the post, and I thought it was pretty certain that Mr. Adams put the ref. in as yes, a joke. MY point was that I dislike Carroll's (and pretty much anybody's) obfuscatory writing, thus I am not familiar line by line with his work, thus I probably wouldn't get a reference to it by Adams or anybody, and I don't want to have to stop enjoying the reading, break off the story line in my head, and start wondering what a certain sentence or paragraph might be a reference to. That's all.
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