From the Prospero blog via Counterparties:
The world's worst sentence?
FINANCIAL books are not renowned for their literary merits. Neverthless, the reader is still entitled to expect something better than the following (from Philip Mirowski's new book "Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste"):He thinks that's bad? Compare/contrast with:
Yet the nightmare cast its shroud in the guise of a contagion of a deer-in-the-headlights paralysis.That is not just a mixed metaphor; it is meaningless and pretentious at the same time. One would nominate it as the world's worst-written sentence but it is only the opening clause. After a semi-colon, the author drones on for a further 32 words, from which Economist readers should be spared....MORE, including Orwell.
1) "Swiss Feel Jobless Chill as Axe Falls on Alpine Idyll"
One headline - three metaphors!
-Strange Bloomberg Headlines
2) "Cheryl’s mind turned like the vanes of a wind-powered turbine, chopping her sparrow-like thoughts into bloody pieces that fell onto a growing pile of forgotten memories"
-1st Place, 2011 Bulwer-Lytton Contest
3) "Like a rottweiler on a slightly undercooked leg of lamb, MarketBeat refuses to let go of its probe of the depths of Thursday’s Flash Crash, particularly the momentary trades that priced ostensibly healthy companies such as Accenture at one cent...."
-Former Wall Street Journaler (now QZ) Matt Phillips
Know what I'm sayin'?
