A Spork in the Road

I abhor the colloquial use of “literally” as an intensifier.

“She literally took forever to answer my question.”
“He was literally foaming at the mouth.”
“I was literally burning up.”

I’m all in favor of colloquial speech. I think casual grammatical structures are a natural consequence of how the brain operates in conversation, and I don’t expect myself or anyone else to preserve elegant syntax when chatting at the water cooler.

But must we really abuse the word “literally,” a gentle word that has done no violence to us or our loved ones? Can we not restore it to its natural meaning, rather than yoking it to wild metaphors that are in no way meant literally?

Please, be conscious of your use of this lovely word. Use it advisedly. Or I will hunt you down and make you suffer.

Literally.

I am one of those people who reads the dictionary as if it were a novel.

Some day, when I have more disposable income, I’m going to subscribe to the Oxford English Dictionary online.

This is a project fully suited to the web. Given the rate of expansion of the English language, it’s laughable to print an unabridged dictionary at all. It’s out of date before it comes off the press.