composite words

As in whimpersigh, shiverslide and so forth.

The first time I read such words was in thejennabides fics so in my mind these are associated with her. Rightly or wrongly, she seems (to me) the inventor of them. When I read anyone else using them, I think, 'aha, thejennabides's influence'.

I used to like these words but now I'm sick of them. I used to think they were a nifty and even beautiful way to combine two sensations / emotions. Now I think they are a lazy way to avoid being precise. I now prefer to use one of the two words (decide: is he whimpering? or is he sighing?) or to separate them in the traditional way ('he whimpered, he sighed', 'he whimpered and sighed', whatever).

Do you knowunderstand what I meanintend? What are your thoughtsopinions on thisit?

further musings on the first person

A while ago I posted some musings on pov which resulted in some interesting discussion about the peculiarities about first-person pov.

Here's what the narratologist Gerard Genette has to say about that:

( first-person narrative )

hindi/urdu

As my Hindi consists of snatches only, mostly gleaned from sub-titles (and hence confined largely to the dil, divanna, kuch nahi variety, *g*), I can't tell what sort of speech people are using in most films.

For example, do some films have a mix of Hindi and Urdu? And when is Urdu used -- is it more 'elevated'? E.g. the Chayya Chayya and also the Satrangi re lyrics from Dil Se seem more poetic than the songs, say, from KKHH -- are they also in a different language? And would audiences still understand?

And the way that people lapse into English for whole phrases or just words: is that just a recent 1990s thing (in the movies, that is)?

And, most importantly, do you think I can actually *learn* Hindi, sort of osmotically, just by watching enough films and reading Shah Rukh's lips a lot????

ETA: Whoops. This was meant to go on the bollywood community. But heh, as you're all responding so kindly, I'll leave it here as well.

w.q. orchardson research fun question on pictorial storytelling

Some of you know that I'm writing a book on visual narrative. And next week I start teaching a module on the topic of my book. So this is the exercise I'm going to give the students as homework for their first week, and I thought I'd let you in on it and shamelessly syphon off your ideas and thoughts. If you want. :-)

( Tell me the story of this picture. )