It was on July 14 that I launched a campaign to proclaim “the democratization of writing.” I sorely regret it.  Not the campaign, the “democratization.” That is an arid, scaly, bureaucratic word that discredits the glory of “Everybody can write!”

Recanting deserves more than a paragraph, because this coinage (“democratization”) is an example of the language that the public abhors or should abhor.  E.B. White, one of my stylistic heroes, warned me sternly about applying the “-ize” suffix in the “Words and Expressions Commonly Misused” chapter of Elements of Style.

Never tack ize onto a noun to create a verb. Usually you will discover that a useful verb already exists. Why say “moisturize” when there is a simple unpretentious word “moisten”? (50-51)

White was not always right, but on this I think he nailed it.  Writers have a wanton attraction to bombast, and they are well-served by E.B. White or some trusted reader, who can advise them when they are lifting off from the solid ground of meaning into the gust of affectation.  Even that sentence was a stylistic leap that might bear scrutiny.

But my concern today is “democratization.” No word that begins with “demo-” (people) should end with “-ize.” If I were annotating White’s famous style book, I would add that admonition.  For the same reason I would not advocate “humanizing” anyone, although the word “dehumanizing” sounds just right.

Instead I searched for a natural metaphor for the recruiting of more writers into the realm of literacy, and I came up with the word “saturation.” Websters Unabridged defines “saturation” as “soaked, impregnated or imbued thoroughly; charged thoroughly or completely; brought to a state of saturation.”   This sounds more like a completed process than a goal for literacy, but I like the image of one substance being full of another. We begin in the realm of literacy, but we wish to populate it more and more with readers who identify themselves as writers.  It would not be enough to “infiltrate” this realm of literacy. No it must be “saturated.”

So allow me the writer’s privilege of revising my campaign, calling it the “saturation” of writing in the realm of literacy. I welcome reader participation in the coining of terms for this campaign, because it is, after all, a popular movement to give writing it due place.  Perhaps this is what I mean, but not what we mean.  I would be mindful of that.

So this is much ado about meaning, and I promise not to make a habit of it. But I felt some repentance was called for, especially since I think writing and meaning should be soul-mates. Writing is  often a prodigal child (in more ways than one) and needs to return home to the welcome of meaning at every opportunity.