purple prose does not sound black and white when it is spoken. When he was criticised by William Faulkner for his limited vocabulary, Ernest Hemingway gave a reply that was not intended as advice for speechwriters but works as such anyway: ‘Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words? He thinks I don’t know the ten-dollar words. I know them all right. But there are older and simpler and better words and those are the ones I use.’
