Among all the chunks of meaty stuff on the noticeboard, I thought I'd put this little one up... Today a line caught my eye. I noticed that the home page of the Writers' forum opens with the words 'A picture's worth a thousand words' and then goes on to say how much worth a word is. Should it be 'A picture's worth a thousand words.' or 'A word's worth a thousand pictures.'to fit the context of the Home page message? :) This is just a trite aside to relieve probably my own tedium; no offence meant to anyone esp the Home page designers. :) Also I hope someone will get caught up in the grammar snarl of the line and lose lots of sleep, and I will then dance with glee over a prank well played... Ha! Actually I don't and I won't. :)

A picture is worth a thousand words, and it often takes a thousand words to really describe it, but take just one word "love" and pictures of long walks on the beach, long distance phone calls, where nobody says anything; the empty feeling, when the other person is gone; and the pictures that come to mind go on and on. Take another word "storms" and your write in the challenge. (sic)

That's taken out of context. You have to read the whole thing to get the meaning:

A picture's worth a thousand words.

Bah! Humbug!

A clever turn of phrase will call forth an explosion of images unique to each reader.

Message edited on: 04/20/2005 07:35

Good catch dialyn :) I have to agree with labinski on that as well. While a picture may require mountains of words to truly describe, there are words that have defined who we are as a species. Simple words spark the imagination and conjure up the images that artists have tried to depict through the centuries. Powerful things those words are ;) David L. Writer's Coord. Woefully too absent from the forums and needs to get off his keester and reply more :)

I wondered what happened to you and your keester. :) Don't be such a stranger....I depend on you to keep me in line. :D

LOL! Well you know me, I'm the writer's taskmaster! I'm here to keep everyone in line! Things have been pretty busy outside of Renderosity and conspiring to keep me away from the forums, but I shall flaunt the conspiracies and be around anyway :)

I hope you have been writing and getting stories into those contests that you were looking into. :) Or are you on the great job hunt (I'll be doing that next year...I may need advice from you).

I've been on the great job hunt for quite a while now! It seems that the game's afoot, but it's not under my feet :P The job market isn't quite what I'd like it to be. And I have actually been writing, though I need to get on it more. Work has been sapping my energy more than I'd like to admit. I'm hoping for some cool down time now that we're approaching summer!

Well, at the risk of being obtuse, I think that's exactly what I'm trying to convey-the power of words. One word's worth a thousand pictures, no matter how well painted, because it sparks off the imagination and there is no limit to imagination, versus one picture's worth a thousand words because a picture says it so much better than words. There's nothing personal here-it's just my interest in words and their shades of interpretation. :)

I misunderstood your intent. I apologize. It's easy to misunderstand on the forums.

AH! The light dawned. Dumb! Dumb! Dumb! That's me and kicking myself. I just noticed that the line 'A picture's worth a thousand words' is in italics and obviously is a quote. Followed then by 'Bah! Humbug!' is perfectly in context. In fact, the subtle aspersion cast is delightful, and causes the Writers' forum to hold its own Oh! so well. :) How on earth did I not notice it? Must be post-modem trauma.. This is matter to write a funny poem about. Hm! Dialyn, you're right, it was in context, and there's no need to apologize-I mentioned it wasn't anything personal, and I certainly wasn't offended. :) Thank you kindly anyway; you must be the binder-upper of wounds around here. (smile) Thanks others for the storm of replies.:) Methinks, my mundane point was a storm in a tea cup. I'm sure everyone's writing up a storm for April's challenge. :D

Don't be too hard on yourself...I have had my share of being misinterpreted and misinterpreting things so I try to give the benefit of the doubt these days. I think the process of the words moving from the author to the reader is a most mysterious one. I have an idea. I write down some lines to communicate that idea. Someone translates those lines and almost inevitably creates something new that is their own idea. It is quite amazing.