a blogging principle
Posted
March 2, 2008 
Comments(2)
Comments(2)
Kill the cuttlefish. Stick to sincerity.
“The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink.”
George Orwell, “Politics and the English Language”, 1946 English essayist, novelist, & satirist (1903 – 1950)
Is there specific meaning to “killing the cuttlefish?” We have literally killed them when Andy ate some in Venice…but, I’m guessing that’s not what you mean
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Essentially, “killing the cuttlefish” means to stop the sputtering language of insincerity that he describes as “a cuttlefish spurting out ink.”
(note: I didn’t think I’d ever write the word cuttlefish so many times.)