One Wank After Another

[coalcube]

A blank assignment is a funny thing, isn't it? When you have it, you don't appreciate it, and when you miss it, it's gone.

Wednesday 10 December: Default deadline (9pm UTC)
Wednesday 17 December: Assignment deadline (9pm UTC)
Wednesday 24 December: Main collection works reveals (9pm UTC)
Thursday 25 December: Madness collection works reveals (9pm UTC)
Thursday 1 January: Author reveals, end of event (9pm UTC)

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Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Fascinating new wank, thank you, coalie.

Italics are most commonly used for structural purposes (for example, internal thoughts, or flashbacks, or telepathy or what-have-you) and for emphasis. The average fic or published novel probably won't collapse into illegibility if all the italics were lost, but that doesn't mean they don't serve a purpose.

The reason italics are overused is that you formatting a specific word differently to give it emphasis inherently comes with diminishing returns. If you emphasize every other word or are relying on it in lieu of making sure your prose sounds strong regardless of how it's formatted, then yes, that's bad.

But that's true of many stylistic tools.

[(Anonymous)]

"and for emphasis"

99% of the time in the fics I read? It's this. Rather than relying on their prose to make the flow natural, fanfic writers add italics. Thought bubbles in italics are a very early 2000s writing style which I've stopped seeing in the wild except for Yuletide. I rarely see thought italics except for fic in canons with canonical telepathy, and it's rare even there.

Part of amateur writing is having fun exploring stylistic tools. Overuse of those tools is a stage in writing which some people stay in for their entire writing lives. When you are giving a gift to someone, they will have varying opinions about the equivalent of your fourteen year old self's obsession with glitter stickers on all your folders. Some will love it and others won't, especially if the glitter interferes with their accessibility device.

[(Anonymous)]

*jerking motion*

[(Anonymous)]

Overusing any stylistic and rhetorical device is bad. But "DNW: italics" (or even "DNW: italics for emphasis") isn't simply preventing overuse, it's preventing it altogether. If it's an accessibly issue, obviously that's fair. Otherwise, it's just a silly attempt at DNWing bad writing that's so broad it also catches a lot of things that are not bad writing and it will most likely make bad writing (which sometimes relies on emphasis markers to make sense) worse.

You can do it, of course. But, to paraphrase what you said, writers will have varying opinions about you limiting the stylistic tools they are allowed to use because you think you unlocked the secret to avoiding bad writing.