Can the level of language in Gita-daily articles be made simpler?
From Man Mohan P
Thank you very much for providing BG articles for free.
I have one request,if the English vocabulary used in articles can be made simple (normal or common vocab as in Srila Prabhupada’s books),it may be more understood by common people having normal English background like me without the help of dictionary.
Please forgive me for my offenses.
Sample of Gita-daily article’s use of literary devices:
18.32 – When the conscience is dumbed and numbed and dumped…[C1]
A security provider[C2] who has protected us for millennia from ourselves has now been branded as outdated and unneeded[C3] ; its very right to existence is being questioned.
That beleaguered battler [C4] is, of course, our conscience, the voice within who cautions us when we do wrong and commends us when we do right.[C5]
When we blatantly displayed sexual obscenity on TV, our conscience protested. We hit it on the mouth with a rock on which was emblazoned “the right to enjoy beauty.” The impact made the conscience dumb. That our “right” started erasing the difference between human society and animal society didn’t matter; the right was what mattered.[C6]
When we piled up tons of explicit content on the internet, our mute conscience expressed shock with its eyes. Not tolerating its audacity, we gave it an injection on which was embedded “the right to sexual freedom.” The jab left it numb. That our “right” led to the skyrocketing of horrendous sexual abuses like rape, incest and pedophilia didn’t matter; the right was what mattered.
When we legalized the murder of the infant by the mother, our conscience, though dumb and numb, still shuddered. Not wanting to see even its face, we threw it out of the door using a bouncer whose T-shirt roared [C7] “the right to moral relativism.” That our “right” to choose which morality, if any, to follow bred psychopaths whose “morality” told them that nothing was wrong in massacring innocent people didn’t matter; the right was what mattered.
The Bhagavad-gita indirectly predicts our getting the rights wrong [C8] when it states (18.32) that intelligence in the mode of ignorance perceives everything topsy-turvy (sarvarthan viparitams ca).
Does our dumbed, numbed, dumped [C9] conscience have any chance of survival?
Only if we dare to ask ourselves a hard question: without it do we have any chance of survival?[C10]
[C1]Literary Device (LD) called assonance that uses rhyming sounds in proximate words (Here last three-letters of four-letter words are nearly similar “umb”, “umb” and “ump”)
Also another LD called polysyndeton that uses “and” repeatedly in a list to create a musical effect and stimulate contemplativeness. Eg. Saying “here and there and everywhere”, instead of simply saying “here, there and everywhere”.
[C2]LD called anthropomorphism that treats a concept (here “conscience”) as a human being to help readers connect with it emotionally – instead of just intellectually, as would be the case without the use of this figure of speech.
[C3]Rhyming endings: “ed”
[C4]LD consonance – a type of alliteration involving repletion of consonants (here the “b” sound)
[C5]LD Parallel structure using “when we do” in both clauses and having both clauses starting with a consonance (words starting with c – cautions and commends)
[C7]LD called personification, ascribing life to a non-living thing to bring about an emotional connection; LD anthropomorphism treats as a human being ; personification, as any form of life, as conveyed by using the word “roared” for a T-shirt
[C8]LD that is a variant of antithesis – bringing two contrasting concepts adjacent to surprise and stimulate.
[C9]LD called asyndeton that accelerates the pace and heightens the impact by avoiding the concluding “and” that is normally present in a series. Eg the well-known 3R formula of ecologists: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.
[C10]Modified version of LD called chiasmus. Similar to Kennedy’s famous “Ask not what the nation has done for you; ask what you have done for the nation” Here it is a variant of “Does it have any chance of survival? Without it, do we have any chance of survival?