Automated variation
I went on a course this week – ‘Effective copywriting’ – all part of my plan to transform myself from grubby B2B sub to highly-paid marketing professional. It was a pretty good course and I think I may have picked up some useful tricks about lateral thinking. But, the tutor would insist that we should avoid using the same word twice. He called this ‘elegant variation’.
I’ve written about this before. I thought it was hatched up by the conspirators – the ones that laugh at editorial staff everywhere – or that it was something that teachers had told us not to do at school.
“Why not think of a different word to make it sound more interesting?”
I thought it was in deference to their primary school teachers that sports journalists called football teams ‘tourists’ and ‘visitors’. Now I see that the rot is deeper.
Is it any wonder, I ask you, that in this climate of so-called ‘elegant’ variation, I have to edit ludicrous sentences? Like this, for example:
“Wind turbines harness the power within a moving air mass and convert it into electricity.”
By the way, please do add any similar nonsense that you’ve had to stomach in the comment box below. But for now let’s just dwell on this whole theory of ‘elegant variation’.
The tutor – who was in every other respect, very good – insisted when challenged that repetition should be avoided unless it was being used for effect. He quoted Tony Blair, saying:
“Education! Education! Education!”
But I think this was just a clever way of adding weight to his own argument. Blair has long become a figure that everyone loves to hate, and this particular speech is a bit of a joke anyway.
He talked about how ‘The Sun’ uses elegant variation, referring to prisoners as ‘lags’ and ‘inmates’ and so on. And, after listening to him, I began to see that there is a place for this sort of variation – elegant or not – in some publications and circumstances.
But not on a recorded message announcing phone menu options.
I found this out the hard way. I discovered my phone was missing and tried to report it on the allegedly 24-hour phone line.
“For blah-di-blah-di blu-pah-pah, press 1.
“For blupity-blurpity-boom-tish-tish, hit 2.
“For an upgrade or if you’re thinking of leaving us, it’s 3.”
Now, I realise that there is a perfectly logical argument that says:
“You were stressed. You’d lost your phone. And you kept redialling because nobody ever picked up the phone, no matter which option you picked.”
Or perhaps what really got to me was the annoyingly-cheery voice that seems to be on all mobile phones no matter who your contract’s with – a voice that was chosen for a market of hip young people (who would never use the word ‘hip’). A voice that sounds altogether too happy by half.
Or may be it’s because when I finally did get through – the next morning – they were completely unhelpful and said I should have made more effort to call them the night before.
But really I think the truth is the variation wasn’t elegant so it didn’t work. It was as contrived and as ludicrous as “a moving air mass”.
