How can we talk to/about other writers you love?
When I talk about artists whose work I love, what words would be used? What (almost) can be replaced with the verb love when we say that I
love Dostoevsky.
What I mean here is I love his works or books, but not him as personally even his personality which I have no chance to know.
In my opinion, because of the ten years he lived a lot of time it is OK to say love to Dostoevsky; we have to be very careful not to overtly scare people off and then say it again, in very short order. And when we use this sentence for writers or singers who are still alive, the sentence’s meaning become ambiguous.
I love Adele
for two sentences. In each of these
sentences they make people think that I love her.
Which words should native speakers use when thinking about people that love to read?
I believe you over-think this only a little bit. If neither fluency nor the ability to understand expressed words were significant, then English could easily be dangerous.
Let me give an analogy. If I say to a friend I’m stuffed, it would imply that I am likely to be facing a tax bill. If, on the other hand, I visit a particularly good steakhouse and come out and say “I’m stuffed”, it would imply that I had perhaps over-indulged in the 285 gram Victoria fillet and garlic potato mash. Even though exactly the same expression is used in both cases I would have no need to distinguish between the two of them since the meaning is obvious (at least to an Australian) from the context. When I say “stuffed”, I am not referring to myself having undergone the process of taxidermy”.
Similarly, there are millions of people around the world who would be familiar with Adele’s work. As with most people, the ones who know her, both well and personally, would be likely somewhere in double or low triple digits. No matter how dark it is, I have always looked into her; it often seems like she is someone who is so beautiful, so as to know her, so as to be invisible. If you were to say to me that you “love Adele” I would take it to mean, just on statistical probability alone, that you love her work because it is HIGHLY improbable that you know the woman herself How can you make a girl loveable with no proof that you know her, but also that you are not. Yes, you should not be. And that and that is, her body of work. What if I knew you watched her daily and would have asked for clarification below?
Since reasonably well balanced individuals can’t develop romantic attachments to literary works, there’re pretty obvious, what I’m referring to. I can say that I love Dr. Richard A Gabriel, but since neither moustaches or Y chromosomes are my thing (and again because it’s highly unlikely that we’ve met, and we haven’t) it’s pretty obvious that I’m referring to his works like Scipio Africanus: Rome’s Greatest General, a History of Military Medicine from Sumer to the Fall of Constantinople, and not to the man himself. I hope that the fact that he is still alive makes no difference because context is king. I love reading Hemingway and F Scott Fitzgerald even though I am not sure how much they like each other. I know it sounds like a time machine in fact is in their blood.
For the sake of possilty, you can only append the word work rather than the usual “job”. I love Adele The Love Song’s work” (or “songs”, or “albums or, in the case of writers, “writing”) allows no
room for misunderstandings or contempt.
What are your thoughts
on Leonardo da Vinci’s works? Where?
