Thursday, February 01, 2007

On Properly Misspelling Words

There's only one instance I can think of in which purposefully misspelling words is justified: When the writer is trying to impersonate a drunkard. This is a tricky proposition, because the writer wants to maintain a level of quality and clarity to his work, but also make his prose just jagged enough to seem like he's put a serious dent in a bottle of Beam.

If I may, a great example of this can be found on a blog attached to another little project of mine. The Star Blog (follow the links on the site if you're curious about the back story; I won't take up your time here) is written by a good friend of TOSC. His first post on the site is written in what's supposed to be a drunken stupor. I'm biased, but I think the writer does a bang-up job. Here's the money line:

In closing, I’d like to say that it is an honor and a privilege to server the great community of Great HAven with this new websit.


Notice how the sentence is still easy to read; the reader doesn't need to go back over the line to gather its meaning. But it's strewn with just enough errors -- believable errors -- that he seems credibly drunk. And angry. And a little pathetic.

My guess is The Star Blog is going to feature a few more drunken rambles, so connoisseurs of the inebriated word may want to check back in.

8 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Craig,

I recognize this guy is a friend of TOSC and all, but that sentence is a bit over the top. I like the rambling and the lousy syntax, but I think there is at least one error too many.

If the guy was shooting for believable (or funny) I think he failed. I don't mean to hurt any feelings, but this is clealry the case.

5:12 PM  
Blogger The Narrator said...

Well, the inebriated word does inspire much disagreement. And wholly illogical arguments, such as you're own.

1:26 PM  
Blogger Bad D said...

i wa sj ust here and someon told me to do a drunk review (aimee and roder told me!!!) cuz they'r bad. Here I was merely explaining why I was writing while in a drunken-jack-ass state, attempting in vain a preemptive apology.

ok wait, this place rocks, it's like thw wallls are bleding cuz efverything's fso fucking godam red!! sory blasephemy! Here I was trying to describe the decor. Yes, it was red. Everything was red, pretty and lustful. This place was comprised of many booths, I guess what a geisha house would look like if it was trying to be cool and red.

yeah, this place is so awesome, i got drunk for free, there were like 10 carafes of sake (FREE) at our nook whihch we all drank. plus a shot of vodka outside, but aht was jst me. lotta people here, when the dj came mixing sweeeeet hous muisic everyone crowde the drance floor then we alll dance. Ah, here's where the damage occurred. No cover all night, free sake so what's the first thing Aimee and I did upon arriving? "Two carafes of sake, please!" She was only allowed to give me one. Rodger was already there, so we started pounding them. I would have drank straight from the carafe, but I didn't want people to think I was a drunkard or anything. I mean, c'mon. All together I'm going to say I had around thirteen thousand shots of sake. For free.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/mwO62x-TXuuQWnKSY-JM9Q

1:21 PM  
Blogger The Narrator said...

A. It took me a while to figure out this wasn't written by Bad D himself.

B. This is a fascinating little document, but I'd say it's an example of too much raggedness to the words. I mean, who could possibly write that poorly? That's not believable.

11:23 PM  
Blogger Bad D said...

Yes, it's an actual drunk review written by an actual drunk while still drunk. A careful study reveals a reckless use of commas, a complete disregard for capitalization, and an "I can't believe I'm still able to type" array of added or omitted letters.

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