Ruy and Fuks’ bullshit – 11/10/2023 – Sérgio Rodrigues

Good bullshit: we recently had a good debate about writing and language. The writer Ruy Castro published in this Sheet the chronicle “Write well” (28/9), in which he adds a precious touch: writing is rewriting. And cut:

“Rewriting consists of purging the unnecessary. If an adjective does not serve as nourishment for the noun it attaches to, one of the two is wrong. And there are adverbs so that, automatically (whoa, look at one!), they intrude into the text and , generally (other!), can be erased without prejudice”.

The writer Julián Fuks responded —or seemed to respond, although Ruy is not mentioned— on UOL, just over a week later, with “On writing well: a declaration against the empire of simplicity”:

“No one will tell me how to write well, no tyrant will dictate what words I should say, if my verbs seem old-fashioned, if my adjectives are invasive and solemn, if my adverbs lengthen sentences unnecessarily, if my metaphors are as dead as a mouse crushed by a train, if my syntax is sinuous and austere, (…) incapable of clarity, opposed to pleasure”.

Fuks emphasizes the freedom of literary creation, which is sacred indeed. A lot of people I know liked this chronicle. I kept thinking: what tyrant is this who tries to prohibit someone from using as many words as they want?

Where is this villain in a written culture of Iberian origin that has always been wordy? In the baccalaureate and singing land of Ruy Barbosa, of the verb as a marker of power, of opaque but mesmerizing speeches?

The focus of the discussion deserves adjustment. Yes, the praise of clarity and conciseness became commonplace after the prosperity of the “objective” journalistic textual genre in the 20th century, mainly English-speaking.

But before that, the power of synthesis was worthless? Oh, it was worth it. The poets of ancient Greece cultivated the brevity of the epigram. At the beginning of the 18th century, the Englishman Alexander Pope, translator of Homer, declared in verse that words are like leaves on a tree: when very abundant, they can hide “the fruit of meaning”.

Ruy’s principle is unquestionable for a certain type of writing, which is more informative. In the game of literature, in which language must justify itself, it does not apply — or it does apply, but not in the same way. Anything goes there, as long as it works.

Fuks lines up words to reaffirm the right to line up words and mark a domain in which freedom cannot be less than absolute. Right.

However, the search for clear and fair expression continues to be very useful when finding what to do with absolute freedom.

The baroque of verbal excesses also demands precise words; even more precise, like in a heavy metal solo in which the player’s technique must be more refined the more noise he makes.

It seems to be the case with most human scribes that, in the first spurts, the words stick out at least a little, they spread out. Putting them in the right place according to the intended effect is necessary, it doesn’t matter that there are plenty of nouns, adjectives and adverbs.

Fuks knows this. His cry of rebellion found an echo because it is a defense of freedom, perhaps even of excess as an important aesthetic value — which it is, as tropicalistas know.

In any case, for fear that the bullshit would be misinterpreted by those at the beginning of the journey, I did what I don’t like to do: I got involved. Does good bullshit have a mitigating factor?

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