[dpark]

I'm assuming you're using "an affect" in the sense of "an affectation" or "affected" here, in which case, no. Plainness, simplicity, straightforwardness are words that would describe "as spoken" writing. They are also literally antonyms of "affect" in this context, which would mean pretentiousness, artificiality, pomposity.

[foldr]

I just mean that there's nothing inherently sincere about plainness and simplicity. Some people adopt a plain and simple style disingenuously, and others write in a more flowery style out of a genuine aesthetic motive. In French, 100 years ago, the kind of style you're advocating would have been the "marked" case. That is, readers would probably have attributed disingenuous motives to someone who chose to write a history book in the style of spoken conversation.

[dpark]

> * That is, readers would probably have attributed disingenuous motives to someone who chose to write a history book in the style of spoken conversation.*

Okay, but they'd also probably be able to understand it. So, tradeoffs.

[foldr]

I want my clothes to be practical. Some people want this and want everyone else to know it, so they buy really ugly clothes just to prove that they don’t care about aesthetics.

You seem to think that it’s impossible for prose to be aesthetically pleasing and comprehensible at the same time. But in fact, the quoted text is both. If it had been written in a plainer style, I probably wouldn't have bothered reading all of it. So no trade off in this instance.

[dpark]

I find it neither. I find the phrasing off-putting and the content low for the number of words.

[foldr]

If you can't comprehend it, how have you managed to determine that the content is low for the number of words?

[dpark]

Now you're being disingenuous and borderline trolling.

At no point did I say it's literally impossible to read.

[coldtea]

>Plainness, simplicity, straightforwardness are words that would describe "as spoken" writing. They are also literally antonyms of "affect" in this context, which would mean pretentiousness, artificiality, pomposity.

"Spoken writing" can be just as artificial and pretentious -- e.g. upper class writers writing as if they grew up in da hood. Or people dumbing down their language to sell more.

How we speak with a friend, and how we write, doesn't have to share the same language or tone or expressions or vocabulary even. Spoken is a stream of consciousness that we express in real time. Written is forever, so we have time to refine what we write, go deeper, be more artistic, add flourishes, and so on. This is not the same as "being obscure for being obscure's sake".

To make an analogy, what you ask for, in photography terms would be "all photography should be real life documentary-style scenes".

In fact, even "spoken" changes form all the time: you don't talk to your bong buddy the same as you talk to your parents, or spouse, or the same way you give a lecture as when you casual chat over coffee, or when you teach students. Tone changes, expression changes, vocabulary changes, level of difficulty changes, etc.