what are people's views on 'made-up' words in poetry?

what are people's views on made up words in poetryand novels? i love them, but it drives some people nuts. For example, Golding wrote something about waves 'flinking' in his book 'Lord of the Flies'. I can create a vision of the waves from this word. It is almost as if they are curling over and the sunlight is catching the tips of the waves, and the froth is gently fizzing onto the sand. Is this idea appealing or a complete anathoma?

 

Hi Velvet and welcome to the forum. Words are not 'made up' as it were. To fully understand that, you would have to appreciate that our perception of time gives the illusion that what we have seen is the creation of a word. In reality that word was created in an instant that incorporate/s/ed the creation of an existence and its spontaneous, subsequent destruction, much like a pulse. Ergo, what we measure as an occurance in our understanding of a lifetime stands for infinite trivial data when it represents non-particles to the n-th degree within a 'pulse' within an irrelevant dimension, or in simpler words, a pulse within a totally insignificant happenstance, perhaps even a glitch in the matrix. BTW Have you tried actually PUMPING words, instead of making them up? It's far more uplifting. As an exercise, see if you can change some of the words in 'Lord of the Flies' and PUMPING them up to make them reaaally dynamic. Even 3 dimensional!

 

Lewis carrol the jabberwocky

 

The Labor Party Manifesto is full of made up words as well.

 

White, what you have written sounds aboslutely fascinating, though my comprehension of it is only just within my grasp! Could you give an example of 'pumping' a word?
PS the jabberwocky- of course!

 

YEEEEAAAAAHHHH !!! thats iiiiit maaaaaannnn !
The stooooorrrrieees greeeeeat !
hey you must live in England where word pumping has become the most fashionable thiing in society - even tony blair used it in his lasat speech to connect with the grooooovy new scene thats reeeeaaaaallly taaaaken offff maaaan!

 

here is a poem I wrote

The grellex of falancum sat flibong on the commo
here the bracak there the flobborg
then the drossim shorve
and with a grossipa fribbung mo
jillip smaddung proe

scallabag abagrah
the shillig hummi goll
abracak smafakat sillo jumi ko
and what gogga figgi ogga
smuthin smuthin goe
but far dessig deessi cappi
ogra fogra may
the boggrip abti bacca hoppa
folig dolig wohay

 

Well ultimatly all words are 'made up' at some point. What matters to me is that the writer is able to convey their ideas and meaning through the words, but that's quite subjective. I found 'a clockwork orange' very frustrating to read because of all the created slang in that, but enjoyed Jabberwocky.

 

I sang the Jabberwocky in choir.
That was interesting.

 

Truthiness, a made up word given to us from Stephen Colbert was the number one word in 2006 according to Webster's.

 

It may surprise you to know that the language used in clockwork orange is entirely real and the author used to work for British secret services. As he was fluent in russian (cold war days) so they could hold a conversation in a insecure place without people being able to understand too much - he and his colleages would speak a sort of slang ridden part russian, part english, language suffused with common slang of the secret services thrown in.
It was a highly poetic language they also had that backslang which was also something they perfected between them

 

I've been away for a bit, because I was helping my cousin with his concert last night at the Roundhouse in Camden, down the road, which was mentaaaaaal!

Anyway, if you read Rah's comment, I think you'll get the idea. I thought he was joking when he said that Tony Blair PUMPS out words, but I actually saw him doing it on TV the other day!!! Anyway, I thought WORD PUMPING originated in the US?!

 

Thanks to you and other geniuses Britain is now above the USA in in the word pumping league. Most bands in britain now pump words
imagine which actully expesses it better - a or b?

this is (a) by oasis as dullards write it

Maybe I don't really want to know
How your garden grows
I just want to fly
Lately did you ever feel the pain
In the morning rain
As it soaks through to the bone

this is (b) by oasis as wordpumpers write it
Maybeeeeeee I don't really want to know
How your garden growwwwwwwws
I just want to flyyyyyyy
Latelyyyyy did you ever feel the paiiiiiiiiin
In the morning raiiiiiiin
As it soaks it through to the boooooooone

we all know which is superior - thank you guru scorpion

 

Peace. Love. Bagels. Thank you Master Sentient. I hope the young padawahn Velvet is taking notes of all this crucial advice. Most important it is that she learns to use the pen sabre combined with the PUMP by mastering the power of the FARCE. Surrounded by the dark side, we are. BTW has anyone noticed that Yoda has a bit of a Cornish accent?

 

Fantabulistic! Gained has information been much. Good old Tony. Mabey pumping is how politician's egos become so inflated that they forget the small amount of logic they might once have harboured in a bygone era. I'm thinking i could get this word pumping thing to a bit of operatic recitative and hey presto; pre-packed intensity of expression without the need for added histrionics.

 

Take a look at this.

 

I will have to look into the etymology of those words - I cant say that shakespeare invented words like "tranquil" he may have changed the spelling but it is most certainly derivitive of the french tranquille
which predates shakespeare by around 200 years or more
its merely and anglicisation rather than an invention
William Shakespeare (baptised April 26, 1564 – died April 23, 1616)
The adj. tranquil is attested from 1604

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=tranquil&searchmode=none

also quite a lot are merely words that have the prefix un which anyway is either germanic latin or greek.

Interestingly I looked up "undress" and the funny thing is that shakespeare actually reinvented the meaning of the word "dress" to mean putting on clothes but he is not attributed with the term undress

I think though shakespeare certainly did anglicise some of those words and/or change some of their meanings the words generally have a usage that predates shakespeare.
Although its debateable whether one can simply claim to be the inventor of a word simply by sticking un at the front.

I now own unfrontable which from now on shall mean a word which cannot have the prefix un placed in front of it. Unfrontable is unfrontable else it would be ununfrontable
and so is and.

Its certainly a fascinating read that link to the shakespeare list of words.
I had never even considered the possibility he might have invented words

What do you think of claiming ownership just by changing meaning ?

 

A thorough, if not debatable list. Bodikins is a word that drew my interest, but I was perturbed that the word codpiece was not on the list. Neither was baby Jesus. Which was a shame.

 

I am going to bodkinise the english language with unfrontable words

 

Although it is an actual word, I have to admit my delectable fondness for the word 'symposium' and I wish people would use it more often in everyday speech.

As a 'Writers Forum Experiment' we could try using this word throughout the day and see how many times we can drop it into a conversation with other people, ie:

FRIEND: Hi Benedict, are you coming round to the Trouser Badger for a beer tonight?
BENEDICT: No, sorry Friend. I am busy writing a symposium.

or

JEREMY: Hello Hannibal. I see you have been reading a symposium.
HANNIBAL: No, I've been eating liver with some fava beans and a glass of chianti, tch-tch-tch-tch-tch.

See how many times you can use the word symposium in a day. First one to get ostracised from society wins!