When was the last time you heard a politician use words that rang with truth and meaning? Do your eyes glaze over when you read a letter from your bank or insurance company? Does your mind shut down when your employer starts talking about 'making a commitment going forwards' or speaks of 'enhancing the bottom line'? Every day we are confronted with a debased, depleted sludge: in the media, among corporations, in the public services and cultural institutions, at work, and out of the mouths of our leaders. There is a new public language that has been forced on us that makes no sense to outsiders and confounds even those who use it. It is a dead language, devoid of lyricism, emotion, complexity or nuance. Meanwhile, in step with managerial thinking, opinion polls and an impossibly demanding media, our political leaders employ this new language of cliches, jargon, platitudes and weasel words to hide or twist the truth. Don Watson can take it no longer. In Death Sentence, he takes a blowtorch to the words - and their users - that sterilise the language and kill imagination and clarity. Scathing, funny and brilliant, Death Sentence is a small book that is as timely as it is profound.
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About the Author
Don Watson's previous book Recollections of a Bleeding Heart won the Age Non-Fiction Prize and the National Biography Award, among many other prizes. In addition to books and essays, he writes films and attempts to improve public language in occasional seminars and lectures.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Reactionist rant, or, Why does no-one sound like Lincoln anymore?,
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This review is from: Gobbledygook (Hardcover)
'What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.' Johnson wrote it; Watson cites it and embodies it. He and Lynn Truss would get along just fine
And they talk about whingeing poms..
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