Politics and the English Language

I thought I only had one George Orwell book left to read, A Clergyman's Daughter, so I was slightly put out to see another on display when I went into Waterstone's bookshop, titled Shooting An Elephant. Never having seen Shooting An Elephant on sale before, I bought a copy. I also bought a £1 booklet called Politics and the English Language. I could have saved myself a pound there, because it was one of the essays included in Shooting An Elephant. Another essay is the one about Charles Dickens, which I have already read on this site. Anyway, Politics and the English Language was a criticism of the state of English writing of the time. He was complaining about unnecessary verbosity, technical terminology out of context, use of cliché, and a sort of speech that sounds significant but does not actually say much except that it favours one side or another. Lastly he complained about the use of euphemism to disguise politically motivated atrocities. "Collateral damage" and "extraordinary rendition" sound like up-to-date examples of this.

I was amused that many of the tired metaphors he complained about are still used. In particular, the phrase "shoulder to shoulder" reminded me of a certain politician. If you need a clue which politician, look up Orwell's real name. I wondered what Orwell would think about phrases used so often they have their own abbreviations in forum posts, such as btw, iirc, imo, otoh, and so on. They are somewhat redundant, but I often use them. Orwell complained about the use of tired metaphors and clichés, especially when it appeared the person who used them did not know what they meant. I can think of two common examples of that. One is "begs the question" which most people take to mean "raises the question", when originally it referred to a form of logical fallacy. The other is the word 'period'. British people heard Americans on the TV say 'Period!' at the end of statements to make them more emphatic and started doing the same. I am pretty sure they did not realise a period is the American word for a full stop. Orwell complained of ugly, made up, Latin or Greek derived words. A word I dislike is 'facilitate', which is just a fancy word for 'enable' or 'help'. OTOH, I also dislike the word 'incentivise', but cannot think of an alternative. He also disapproved of using the passive voice. This is always a problem to me when I try and write a a technical report. I, personally, am not usually the point of interest in these reports, so writing in the active voice seems wrong. A lot of Orwell's advice reminded me of a plain English guide I read several years ago.

The booklet also contained a review of Mein Kampf written in March 1940. It was more about Adolph Hitler's personality than the book itself. However, I was impressed that Orwell guessed that Hitler would get around to invading Russia before long. He said the only reason he tried to invade Britain first was that the Soviet Union had been easier to bribe.