Tone
I both love and hate the latest stylistic developments for conveying tone. Let me explain. On the political website I haunt, it was common years ago to interpret all caps as screaming. If someone wrote, “THAT IS NOT WHAT I MEANT!” people would actually say, “Stop screaming, you sound hysterical.”
But we’ve come a long way, baby. Posters have now developed conventions for sotto voice, Captain Kirk imitations, and measured tones. For example, recently we were musing on the worst popular songs of all time, and of course, the song Sometimes When We Touch came up.
Sometimes when we touch
The honesty’s too much
And I have to close my eyes and hide.
Yes, the Mr. Sensitive Ponytail Theme Song. Anyway, one wag wickedly confessed that he whenever he hears that song, he mentally substitutes a certain vulgar term for the word “touch.”
I said, “But then it won’t rhyme, and the honesty’s too muck doesn’t make sense.”
He said, “It does to me. And that’s what matters.” Instant sotto voice. Cute, eh?
Captain Kirk imitations abound, meant to suggest someone struggling against a superior (though invisible) force.
“Must… not… make… joke…. must… resist…”
Then of course, there is the measured tone, reeking of deliberation.
“Do. Not. Put. Words. In. My. Mouth. I said nothing of the sort…”
But while I appreciate these developments, I regret the loss of elegance that used to attend writing. Behold, an excerpt from the diary-turned-travel guide, With Malice Toward Some by Margaret Halsey (1938). She describes a group of fellow-Americans on her cruise ship as:
A large group of beautiful, shiny-looking young people who generally travel in a flying wedge and whose voices are distressingly reminiscent of seagulls discovering a floating orange peel. We have not talked very much with these citizens, as most of the secular ones seem to be in the midst of an impromptu mating season.
Man, that’s good. That’s. So. Good.
