Frazz by Jef Mallett for May 28, 2020

Surprise!!

Becoming a lost art.

It works even better. You have more time to organize your thoughts and remove the comments that might pick fights you don’t want.

Written down and even without pictures!

Well, with talking, I’ve always been told, your tongue can get in the way of your eye teeth, and you won’t be able to see what you’re saying!

Hence novels, novellas, short stories, poetry etc etc!

Pen and paper or just email/text messaging?

I believe most commenters on GoComics will agree with the lad. Comments often bring the biggest laughs. Many would be worth saving, if only because a good laugh remembered brings lightness to the soul. One reason I have enjoyed the medium. Wish I had found it sooner.

Ok, I now understand yesterday’s joke.

One of my favorite quotes by mark twain describes the thought and effort they can go into good writing:

“I apologize for such a long letter – I didn’t have time to write a short one.”

Frazz, last frame, irony or sarcasm?

Perfect!

A writer and a reader can make for a wonderful conversation.

Letters, we’ve got letters, we’ve got lots and lots of letters.

A philosopher once opined that the gradual disappearance of carved obelisks, painted symbols, runes, hieroglyphics, and later, the various written languages preceded the gradual disappearance of civilizations, and that a similar process might eventually do the same for all humankind. It suggested to me that he was saying that Ozymandias was prophetic for mankind in total and not just those individuals whose arrogance leads them to see themselves as the ultimate in creation.

Might be just a bit dark, but it begs the question: when the power goes off one final time, will those now obscure forms of communication return to viability and restore balance or is he correct?

Because I’m sure during WWII when soldiers were writing letters to their wives, sweethearts, children, parents, that if you offered them a chance to see their faces in real time they’d have said “Awww, no. Letters are better.”

This is true of more than just Zoom. My son is in prison, and while he frequently calls me, we have long periods of silence because neither of us can think of anything to say. When we write letters, we are newsy, chatty and end up with several pages worth of the stuff we couldn’t think of to say on the phone.

Sadly, about all that’s left of cursive is the cursor. 8^(

Writing doesn’t work so well for everyone.

For example, those who suffer greatly when they are fact checked.

Yes and no. “Reduced to writing” is no mere metaphor. Written language has, or can have, the benefit of clarity and focus, but is simply missing a lot of what makes up spoken language.

Written language works great, unless your language is English or French. If that’s the case, it’s always better to stick with speech whenever possible.

Jef Mallett’s Blog Posts.

Frazz14 hrs · My favorite way to communicate is face to face. My other favorite is in writing, real writing, with words and grammar and stuff. And my other other favorite is through art. They’re all equal but sometimes the order shifts around, and I’m obviously not above combining them.Methods of communication that would seem in between those, like talking on the phone or via video, or writing in some kind of shorthand hurry, or using canned art from the keyboard, are not at ALL in between those and are actually way down the list. Life is not linear, is it? I’d insert a vaguely appropriate emoji here, but I don’t want to.