"Raven" and "ebon," for describing color. And "eldritch."

 

Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way. So fail, it's awesome.

 

I get very pissed off at stories with an Indi Harry or Dark Harry who is trying to hide that he is a wizard from muggles and he says "Oh, Merlin!"

You would think that after he has become totally awesome, gone on five million shopping trips in Knocturn Alley and spent half his life in some sort of Time-Turner induced warp he would be able to think about what he is going to say before he says it.

If I can manage not to swear in the classroom he should be able to use fuck or shit or even something stupid like fiddle sticks instead of Merlin.

This is what turned me off of Brown Coat, Green Eyes. I didn't even get past the halfway mark with that one.

 

But then what happens to the Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Night?

 

Someone says "Harry, you're acting like Dumbledore." and then Harry acts like a rape victim, bawling in a corner in the fetal position and apologizing to everyone he's ever seen.

 

They meet three doors down. This is the Illuminated and Ancient Brethren of Ee.

 

For me, it's the word "palpable".

"The tension in the room was so palpable that Harry was torn in half."

 

This is a cliche of a cliche.

 

Personally, I disagree with this one. When you hear someone say "Oh, Merlin!" your first opinion of them is going to be that they were either A) Trying to keep themselves from swearing and said something stupid in place of a cuss word, or B) They've spent a bit too much time roleplaying and at fantasy conventions.

Your mind isn't going to immediately jump to the conclusion that "Holy crap! That person's a wizard!" just because they say "Merlin." In fact, it's only other wizards that hear him saying stuff like that who would probably ever make the connection.

Although it does get annoying if you have a character saying "Merlin this" and "Merlin that" to every. single. thing. that is even slightly surprising or goes slightly wrong.

 

They die in a fire. An orange/yellow/red one.

 

Jealous girlfriends who use the words 'hussy' or 'tramp' to address or otherwise describe their presumed rivals.

And since the lid's already off the weeaboo barrel, I'd like to gripe about anime characters who speak in a classical manner getting the amateur Shakespeare treatment.

 

Ginny's "fiery hair".
Yeah we get it Ron's room is orange. Stop telling us everytime the story is at the Burrow.
And I doubt Draco says "plebian" as much as you think. We're not in ancient Rome here.

 

"*Harry says something stupid/monosyllabic in response to something someone else said*," Harry replied, eloquently.

"I resemble that remark."

These are used so often nowadays that I'm not sure anymore if people are using them for, albeit poor, comedic effect or honestly have no idea what the meaning of those words are.

 

"Merlin's (saggy) balls!"

It was funny the first few times this appeared in fanfics. Now, I just feel like punching an author in the face if he/she uses this.

 

Probably already mentioned before but I can't stand any time Slytherin is used as an adjective or when people say his "Inner Slytherin."

 

I lampoon that piece of idiocy in one of my stories: Circe's snailtracks, Calypso's crack, Leto's labia, Molly's mammaries, etc.

 

I'm so sick of authors "comparing" smirks.

For example

"Draco's smirk was spiteful but not nearly as full of vitriol as Snape's."

Should there be a separate class on facial expressions offered at Hogwarts? Or is that only for Slytherins?

EDIT: Looking back my example was terrible. Changed it!

 

Can't say I have seen too many of those - guess I got lucky.

I hate it when authors use the word 'ya' instead of 'you' - 'ya see', 'ya think' etc. It just gets on my nerves for some reason. Thankfully, that isn't too prevalent...

 

So if it's not prevalent, it's not really overused, ya hear?

 

How did I miss this thread?

Too many times I've seen idiots accidentally write 'menstruations' instead.


The one I'm tired of seeing is "...the boy, no, the man..."

As in, "Tonks was seeing Harry in a whole new light as the boy, no, the man took Dumbledore down a peg or two."

Every other fucking fic out there has some variation of this, usually multiple times from multiple characters, where someone is so overwhelmingly impressed by a young character's actions that they suddenly realize that character is, in fact, an adult, in spirit if not in body. Usually both...

Oh fucking get over yourself.

I mostly dislike it because, in addition to being overused, it is often in employed in way too dramatic a fashion for the scene at hand; this is mainly because the writer just doesn't have the chops to write a decent scene, and so using a melodramatic turn of phrase in a ho-hum situation just causes the whole thing to fall flat.

It's funny, because that line comes from a book that most consider to be awful.

I think Snoopy had more of a hand in spreading the knowledge of this phrase than anything else.

Yeah, I don't mind it too terribly much, but it's true that it doesn't appear in the books.

Strangely enough, the books do have a scene where Snape, of all people to use a muggle phrase, referred to them as "The Dream Team."

Right? I read someone complaining about how infantile it sounded to have characters talking about DADA, and the only conclusion I could reach is that they assumed people pronounced it 'dah-dah' like a baby calling for its father.

Who the fuck would be idiotic enough to do that? (That's a rhetorical question, I've seen some really asinine fic out there.)

DADA is simply the lazy person's way of writing D.A.D.A., which is said exactly as the letters are.

What else are you going to call it, unless you really believe that children taking this course would ALWAYS call it "Defense Against The Dark Arts" or just "Defense" or "Defense class" for short.

Shortening it to 'Dark Arts', as Percy does (in the PS/SS movie) is too misleading, especially since terms for 'dark magic' get tossed around a lot in HP fanfic.

The quote in question, is in reference to Snape: "...everyone knows it's the Dark Arts he fancies."

Without context, this makes it sound rather sinister, like an indictment of Snape's character as someone who loves dark magic (er, anyway), when really all he meant was "Snape would rather be teaching Defense class."

It's like saying "He fancies Narcotics." when what you mean is, "He'd prefer to be working on the Narcotics squad in the police department."

I'll leave alone the instances of both being true, much as I did with Snape. :mrgreen:

Not everyone has perfect diction, this is a small way of showing that, and of telling us more about a particular character.

For instance, I wouldn't bat an eye at Ron using "Ya" instead of "You", but if Snape did it, I'd either be looking for the Polyjuice, or a better author.

This kind of thing is semi-related to the 'author can't write Dumbledore' problem. A lot of writers make his speech too casual, juvenile and, frankly, uneducated.

Probably a reaction to the novelty of JKR writing the phrase "Merlin's saggy left-" 'Shut yo mouth!' into Deathly Hallows.

Somewhat tangential, but I'm tired of people mounting their high horse to bitch about how magical folk wouldn't use any exclamations with religious references in them.

"Oh my god!" "Goddammit!" "Go to hell"...

They tend to base their argument on wizards not being religious (mostly Christian) because of magic. It's logical... but that doesn't stop it from being very flawed logic.

In fact, it's flawed logic at its best/worst/most idiomatic.

Okay, I get it, the existence of magic naturally precludes the existence of higher beings... until someone speaks up and says, "Yeah, but couldn't it just be that God gave us these powers?" And then you're back at square one.

Sorry.

A: At the risk of sounding pedantic, where in canon is it stated that wizards don't believe in ANY religious systems? (Please spare me the 'It doesn't say that they do!' argument.)

B: How many atheists never say something like "Hell if I know." or "Oh my god!", excluding twats so busy trying to be 'hard core' that they consciously refuse to use any language that is even vaguely religious in origin?

C: It sort of sickens me to use Deathly Hallows as an example, even more so Weasleys in Deathly Hallows, but they are purebloods, so they make a pretty good case.

Molly: "Bill! Thank God, thank God—"
-----
Ron: "She used to come for Christmas every year, then, thank God, she took offense because Fred and George set off a Dungbomb under her chair at dinner."
-----
Ron: "Well, as long as it doesn’t get them into trouble, though they might’ve been arrested already. God, that’s revolting,"
-----
Ron: "God, I hope they made it… If they both end up in Azkaban because of us…"
-----
Ron: "Thank God you inherited your mother’s brains." (My personal favorite, since Ron is owning up to his stupidity here.)
----
​

If you write a story and remake the Wizarding World as you see fit, according to your own vision of it, and part of that vision means they have ZERO faith in any religion, that's fine and dandy. That's your business (Hell, I'd like to think that the world would be a better place without organized religion, but since even the godless alternate Wizarding Worlds are corrupt shit-holes, that doesn't seem to be the case).

What I hate to see, though, is some prick taking apart someone else's stories because wizarding characters use such phrases. After all, canon doesn't preclude religious wizards, and canon wizards do use such phrases.

That's like deciding that Lockhart was actually a secret agent, then getting angry that no one else takes this 'fact' into account when they write.

I guess it falls under "Take your faulty logic elsewhere and stop being a prick."
----

As for the whole blue/cerulean thing... sometimes it works, sometimes not.

Usually it 'works' if the rest of the story doesn't suck. If some brainless fuck is waxing rhapsodic about 'locks of raven hair', and misspelling every third word, then the attempt at using more descriptive language is going to come across as a ham-fisted, pathetically failed attempt at injecting drama into a shitty story.

If the story IS well written, the more evocative language will probably do what it's supposed to do -draw the reader in and more elaborately/accurately relay to them the author's vision- and not really be noticed.

To quote Futurama: "When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all."

To people who decide to be elitist pricks by being 'anti-elitist' and decrying what they see as elitist language (you know, kind of like the anti-bandwagon bandwagon):

Fuck you.

I'll keep my raven hair, thank you. While it is a fool who tries to use a sledgehammer to tap in a carpet tack, it's no more foolish than the person who limits himself to using only one tool when he has many at his disposal.

As with all things, it is about using good judgment, knowing when to use a flowery/obscure/'big' word, or when to ditch the five dollar word in favor of simplicity.

To reiterate what I said earlier, regarding fancy words in a shit story, continuing the construction metaphor: If you put a bunch of fancy 'gingerbread' on a poorly built house, it will continue to look butt-ugly and out of place no matter how much you use, while a well built house could pull it off.

Likewise, some jobs call for a minimalistic approach, either by necessity or to achieve the desired aesthetic.

Mixing these styles can be jarring and is not to be attempted by the uninitiated.
----

A certain Harry/Poppy gross-out fic had some people here jizzing all over themselves, apparently just because it was disgusting. Many cited the great prose when, in actuality, it was a horrendous mish-mash of sentence fragments that ended up making no sense, and bad metaphors masquerading as prose so purple you'd think someone had their hands around the story's neck.

It was bad. It has since been rewritten, but I have not bothered checking it out again, as it's just not my speed... but I'd bet dollars to donuts it still has the 'word' "vargina" in it.

That's right, "vargina." See what happens to everyday words when we rush to make everything else so baroque?

This is an example of someone trying too hard to make something sound artsy/florid/eloquent, but just because, in their reaching, they abused some metaphors, similes, and 'big words', doesn't mean there is no place for such things in literature.

Of course, that should be transparently fucking obvious!

Blanket statements against certain descriptive words and/or phrases are, in most cases, stupid. I can't help but resent, at least a little, anyone who would strive to limit the intelligence of everyone around them because they don't like to see people "usin' them fancy words!"

TL/DR: Maybe you're happy with your little box of eight crayons, but I prefer something with a little more variety, as long as the person using them knows they're for coloring, and not cramming up their nose.