Not Practicing What They Preach

One of my five main principles in writing is to be concise. (The name for the error of not being concise is to be pleonastic, which is a fancy word for “wordiness.”) So here:

And one type of pleonasm is being redundant, which is when the extra word or words mean the same thing as the word you actually need. Don’t do this!

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Pleonasm is related to the word “plenty.” It means “extra (unnecessary) word.” We english speakers tend to be rather generous with our words, so pleonasms are a fairly common error. Here’s another one; last panel. Which word would you leave out?

Maybe leave out both “tad” and “bit.” With either word there, the sentence is an understatement, by the way.

I mentioned the RTFM motto a while back; this one is longer. Last two panels:

Actually, “go back and” isn’t necessary. (We call that phrase a pleonasm. It’s extra words.)

Saying “dark insidious alley” isn’t the error I’m referring to. That’s a pleonasm, more suited for advanced English. Look for something more embarrassing:

https://www.gocomics.com/lostsheep/2023/04/13

Yup, the cartoonist misspelled the personal pronoun in panel two. Should be “you’re.”

You got that, right?

Here’s the sentence, from an article about insomnia in the Spring 2029 New Scientist:

If pills aren’t necessarily the answer for people with insomnia, neither are overly simplistic behavioural interventions.

“Simplistic means “overly simple.” You don’t need the separate word “overly.”

So you’re either repeating “overly,” which is a redundancy, or you’re just inserting the unnecessary word “overly,” which is a pleonasm. Take your pick.

Sorry, no picture.