Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2012 March 15

= March 15 =

prose so bad
I want prose so bad, as bad as this:

The morning was empty, like a chariot whose driver was not in it, out having lunch. Looking around, I could tell that waiting in this cold and gloomy place would be no picnic. I looked up at a church clock, and it said 7:15 (I'm making this time up, I don't remember exactly but it was early morning anyway). I flipped through my thoughts but came up empty-handed. I would have been shivering, for sure, had I not had 2-3 layers of clothing on. I wasn't too hungry either. Finally, I heard what could only be footsteps: footsteps. I looked in the direction I thought they were coming from, and sure enough they were coming from there. Before I could even recognize the person, however, I had no idea who they were. That's when they said something. "Hello" is what they said. (Again, they might have said "good morning" or "hi"). I said: "Are you John?" And John waited, at first he didn't answer. Was this the person I was meeting? Finally he said: "Yes, I'm John."

obviously this is bad on so many levels. I want to read more like this! A whole story. --80.99.254.208 (talk) 11:10, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Oh, pretty much anything by Ernest Hemingway should fit the bill. Or the Twilight Saga books. Angr (talk) 11:26, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

This promises to be pretty awful, as soon as they get more stuff out.--Rallette (talk) 12:23, 15 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Hemingway has his defenders, I believe. You may be thinking of the phrase "It was a dark and stormy night" - WHAAOE. The full opening paragraph begins
 * It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents--except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.
 * It is held up as an example of purple prose, and has spawned a competition for terrible writing, The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Competition. BrainyBabe (talk) 13:07, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Brainy, did you ever compete? 134.255.45.244 (talk) 18:59, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Fanfiction.net --Colapeninsula (talk) 14:23, 15 March 2012 (UTC)


 * It seems like it's trying to be the literal and rather joking way that Douglas Adams or possibly Neil Gaiman would write but not pulling it off as effectively. Dismas |(talk) 14:57, 16 March 2012 (UTC)


 * "The spaceship hovered in the air, in exactly the same way that bricks don't." Yes, it takes talent, which is lost on many writers. IBE (talk) 05:51, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

Denominations for "police"
I recently asked this question at the Finnish Wikipedia, asking for denominations for "an employee of the police forces", which there seem to be a wealth in the Finnish language. What is the situation with English? I only know of "police (officer)", "cop", and (derogatory slang) "pig". In German, I know of two words: "Polizist(in)" which is the standard, and "Bulle" which is slang. Are there any more? J I P &#124; Talk 22:14, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * We've got List of police-related slang terms, which includes bulls, dicks, feds, flatfeet, fuzz (for leftover hippies), etc. Clarityfiend (talk) 22:25, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * In the UK we've got "bobby", particularly in the phrase "more bobbies on the beat" as a matter of public policy, meaning to get more police officers patrolling the streets. Other more formal terms in the UK are of course constable, police constable (especially abbreviated PC) and before gender neutral phrasing "policeman" and "policewoman" (or WPC - "woman PC"). --rossb (talk) 23:32, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * "Women PC" and similar is all but outmoded now. I remember (when I was very young) seeing a van marked "Police Dogs" and cracking the joke "...or Women PCs, as they're also known." That 80s charm has long since left me, and ditto the term "Women Police Constables". If they're referred to by anything, it's "officers", nothing gender specific. doktorb wordsdeeds 23:54, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Whenever I hear "WPC" I expect the next words to be "Yvonne Fletcher", killed on duty in a manner still unresolved. Our articles on Constable and Police officer may provide other leads for the OP. BrainyBabe (talk) 09:25, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I have a friend who is a paramedic in the London Ambulance Service, who always refers to the police as "the Gendarmes". He also calls Firefighters "dripstands" because at traffic accidents, they are said to be only useful for holding up the Intravenous drip bags. Otherwise, the list linked above seems to be very exhaustive. Alansplodge (talk) 17:39, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
 * the filth, the old bill, woodentops, rozzers, plods, peelers... AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:47, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

We have one in anglo Canada that isn't on the list. I would need a wordsmith to spell it though. Gendarmerie royale du Canada (GRC), is the french name, and the GRC was lengthed to the phonetic grrr-silly-ehs(?)--Canoe1967 (talk) 10:30, 23 March 2012 (UTC)