Questions tagged [wording-choice]
Questions about a writer's precise selection of words as determined by a number of factors, including denotative and connotative meaning, specificity, level of diction, tone, and audience.
12
questions with no upvoted or accepted answers
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Why does Sara frequently describe herself using derogatory words in Pack Challenge?
Someone recommended Pack Challenge by Shelly Laurenston to me. It's erotica FYI--not really sure if this is the place for questions about that, but I thought I would try anyway. The main character has ...
5
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Why are the non-fellow-students not referred to as guns in Clint Smith's "The Gun"?
This is sort of the reverse of my previous question on Clint Smith's poem "The Gun". While it's blatant about referring to all of the kids as "guns", I find it interesting that the ...
4
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Why is Len Deighton so fond of American English?
I am British and have lived in Britain my entire life. I have never heard anyone refer to an estate car as a “station wagon”. I have never heard anyone refer to a criminal as a “hood”. I have never ...
3
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Is there an in-universe explanation for the contradictory language and euphemisms used in *The Screwtape Letters*?
For example, terms like "the patient," "our Father below," and Screwtape's affectionate language towards Wormwood. It actually strikes me as oddly similar to the "doublethink&...
3
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0
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358
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Meaning of a "dry palate" and "frozen rain" in Achebe's "Things Fall Apart"
I am currently reading Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, consider the following passage.
The colonizers just came to the tribe of Mbanta and everyone seemed uninterested...
But there was a young ...
3
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0
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75
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Why these specific "things that fly" in "Kite-Flying"?
Rose Justice, the main character of Rose Under Fire, writes several poems that appear in various places in the book. This is the second verse of Kite-Flying:
Hope waits stubbornly,
watching the sky
...
3
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0
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Is there any significance to the lemons and the port in Ko Un's "Asking the Way"?
"Asking the Way" is a short poem by Ko Un, addressing "You fools who ask what god is" and telling them to ask about life instead, illustrating the principle with examples about ...
3
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0
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Is a fish "Alive with breath" or "Alive without breath"?
J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit contains many lovely riddles, posed in-universe by Gollum and Bilbo to each other. Most of them are original compositions by Tolkien himself, as he explained in one of ...
3
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Understanding the usage of "Philosophy" in Uncle Vanya
In "Uncle Vanya" by Chekhov, I noticed a usage of the word "philosophy" that seemed out of place.
ASTROFF. A woman can only become a man's friend after having first
been his acquaintance and then ...
1
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0
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In Halsey's "You Should Be Sad", why is the expression "alligator tears" instead of "crocodile tears"?
In Halsey's "You Should Be Sad", there's one part that goes like this:
I'm just glad I made it out without breakin' down
And then ran so fuckin' far
That you would never ever touch me again
...
1
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Walter Malone's "The World is My Home"
Walter Malone's poem "The World is My Home" is, on the face of it, openly a plea for humanity to come together as one united brotherhood rather than engage in disputes and wars:
Travel to ...
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What does "I ween that you are better where you are" in "The Heart of the Raven" mean?
The chorus of the song "The Heart of the Raven" by the German band MONO INC. goes like this:
But here in the raven's heart
Your heart is beating on
I ween that you are better where you are
...