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abstractitis
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From: The Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Style
Date: 20000101
Author:Bryan A. Garner
abstractitis.
“How vile a thing … is the abstract noun! It wraps a man's thoughts round like cotton wool” ( Arthur Quiller-Couch, On the Art of Writing , 1943). Abstractitis is Ernest Gowers's term for writing that is so abstract and obtuse (hence abstruse) that the writer does not even know what he or she is trying to say ( MEU2 ). Far be it from the reader, then, to give such writing a coherent meaning.One sympathizes with a keen judge who wrestled with the Internal Revenue Code: “[T]he words … dance before my eyes in a meaningless procession: ...
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