Formal vs Pompous
"Some writers, however, confuse a formal style with a pompous style. Compare a pompous sentence with the formal one.
Formal: You are invited to attend a brief meeting in Conference Room B at 11:30 to discuss the change in travel reimbursement policy and its effect on our division.
Pompous: A brief meeting will be held in Conference Room B to address the consequences and implications with regard to the adoption of new policies for travel reimbursement and associated issues and the effect of their implementation on our division."
I guess then I fall into that category of confused writers. Why on Earth is the popmous paragraph so?
It seems to me that the "pompous" one is just more detailed.
According to the software, one thing it entailed was the usage of more complicated terms such as "consequences and implications." psshhhtttt
Well, I don't think the problem of this sentence is its being too academic, it's just that IMHO it doesn't need to be that long and detailed.
For example:
"implications with regard to the adoption of new policies"
-> "implications of new policies"
"and associated issues"
-> It's vague and useless. Omit it.
"the effect of their implementation on our division"
-> "their effect on our divison"
But then again, I'm not a native speaker.
The second paragraph is major overkill, and a perfect case of never using one word where five will do the same job. That's what takes it beyond formal and into pompous.
Second paragraph is unnecessarily confusing.
I think you can say to have pomp in a text or speech where some "grandeur" is brought in.
I'm not sure anything like that is detectable in the second paragraph. It's just waaaaay too formal.
Maybe over-formal, rather than pompous, is a better-fitting term to describe the way it reads.
Salvete atque valete omnes,
Achab
Well, it becomes pompous because it is so overblown, to the point that it must be self-conscious, and not accidental. Perhaps that's hard for non-natives to discern, but it comes off that way to me.
The pages of Antimoon, including this forum's threads, rank high in Google. Had you ever noticed that?
A search in such search engine on "pompous style" returns this exchange of ours as the third-to-appear result. Leave out the quotes and it will crop up even higher than that!
It's rather impressive, isn't it? Particularly if you take into accout that this thread has been in existence for just about two days so far.
By the way, here's a website all about pomp in language:
www.pompousasswords.com
And here's some thoughts by the incomparable William Hazlitt on the same topic:
www.grammar.about.com/od/rhetoricstyle/a/hazlittstyle.htm
With every good wish,
Achab
Pulchritudinous site, pompousasswords.
Hope Tom doesn't use the site to find word for his next question.