On Stephen Fry, George Orwell and Loving Language
/Oscar Wilde is known to me largely by way of Stephen Fry, who for a long time was known to me only by way of Wilde. After seeing the movie years ago, I remember researching Fry to see if he’d done anything else.
Turns out he had.
If you haven’t seen A Bit of Fry and Laurie, I recommend it for the occasional gut-busting laugh, usually having to do with Fry knocking Laurie upside the head. Physical comedy is so damned satisfying. There are moments in Blackadder too.
YouTube reveals a wealth of slapstick-free material, in which it’s possible to learn that Stephen Fry is seriously smart, occasionally controversial, a marvelous writer and, clearly, a lover of the English language.
I too love the English language, which I use as best I can to do right by people and causes I believe in. My work is to tell stories that need to be told while keeping us safe from passive voice, unnecessary Oxford commas, and the criminal overuse of words like curate, authentic, and intentional, not to mention phrases like having a moment and in the [insert word here] space.
In 1984 George Orwell pointed out that “if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought” — a statement at least as true today as it was 70 years ago.
Let us then fight against language that corrupts thought and disrupts understanding. Let us fight in our grant proposals. Let us fight in our books. Let us fight in our speeches. Let us fight in our brochures, on our social media feeds and on our websites.
I shall never surrender.