"change in literary style; needs research" (late '07/early '08)

I think I was thinking about how the standard literary style has evolved, as distinct from the underlying language, and that it would be interesting to trace. Also, I think I may have started by thinking about how much literary research is bogus, and wondering what good work there is to be done. I'm not sure whether I had any ideas about how literary style has evolved. One idea that occurs to me now is that it seems to approach speech and become more informal, just as speech itself has become less formal, but I'm not sure if those with poor reading skills feel just as condescended to as ever, or whether the modern literary style is less elitist than of old.

12th June 2008