After my final, I headed to a girlfriend’s house to watch the final episode of Gilmore Girls. Say what you will, I used to watch the show all the time until school got in the way. My friend invited some other ladies over, and they had all worked at the same publisher at one time or another. So there were five women with English degrees (well, almost!) in the house.
We ate and chatted while waiting for the show to start. Idly picking up an Entertainment Weekly with “Hermione” on the front, one of the girls started reading some of the reviews by Lisa Schwarzman (I think that’s her name? I’ll probably look it up later. It was Lisa something). Um, yeah. I’d forgotten why I never read that magazine. This woman uses the most pretentious metaphors any of us have ever heard. She used phrases such as “unsettling opaque mask of [something - I forgot what]” and “map of sadness on his face.” I think we were all ready to gag. Then we started pointing out various sections of the “map of sadness” on our own faces.
Look! There’s the ravine of melancholy! I think I see the eye of reason! Ooooh, look at that cheek of distaste! We got a little carried away. Yet we all agreed that few people besides an English major would bother with Lisa’s metaphor-heavy reviews. Sometimes, just coming out and saying it works wonders, Lisa. Think of who your audience is. Will the average reader really look at those phrases a couple of times to decipher your meaning? I think not.
