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John_Conley

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #25 on: February 06, 2007, 10:43:14 AM »
I nominate "A Fine Green Line".

Wonderful premise, but I didn't think it was executed well.
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John Kavanaugh

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #26 on: February 06, 2007, 10:45:10 AM »
Cary,

I have not played Rich Harvest...I do know enough that if the owner offered to fly me up for a weekend I would talk about the course and not his car collection.  I would probably take the redanman view and sell my soul for a free round of golf and a fine dinner.  I doubt if I would ever get hired again and probably end up driving a Subaru like the hero of this story.
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John Kavanaugh

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #27 on: February 06, 2007, 10:48:20 AM »
There is a wonderful architectural and human interest twist to Canyata about how the course was built for his daughters.  I can't figure out how this guy missed it as it is reflected in the design of many of the holes.  It is a true jewel for womens golf and could be a great model for courses in the future.
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Rick Shefchik

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #28 on: February 06, 2007, 10:49:48 AM »
I have to agree that that would have been a great angle for the story. Great writing of any kind, golf or otherwise, is not so much in the words used but in the story told.
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"Golf is 20 percent mechanics and technique. The other 80 percent is philosophy, humor, tragedy, romance, melodrama, companionship, camaraderie, cussedness and conversation." - Grantland Rice

Kirk Gill

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #29 on: February 06, 2007, 10:51:15 AM »
Quote from: John Kavanaugh on February 06, 2007, 09:56:24 AM
Has anyone taken the time to read the article.  That is not golf writing.

I read the article.

In one sense, you're right. This isn't really golf writing per se, it's a puff piece, a breathless pean to the wealth of this Forsyth character. The writer acts as if he's bought and paid for, and seems really excited to make that clear. My favorite line was that the landscape of the course was "muscular as Tiger's Torso."

At the same time, he's writing about something that could be considered "part of the game." The elitism, the snobbish bloated excess, the pandering to the bourgeois desire to be part of something that allows you to be included in a special, exclusionary group........he loves it all. And the writer throws in an addendum - the course seems pretty good, too. But is it the course, or all the "other stuff" that's going to get the 100 members to pony up their hundred grand?
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"After all, we're not communists."
                             -Don Barzini

Eric Franzen

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #30 on: February 06, 2007, 11:04:49 AM »
I would nominate this useless drivel.

http://www.golf.se/extra/news/?module_instance=1&id=72695

This idiot once again sets a new low standard in journalism. I am frankly glad that most of you won't understand a single word of the  linked article...
 
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ANTHONYPIOPPI

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #31 on: February 06, 2007, 11:05:19 AM »
Quote from: Rick Shefchik on February 06, 2007, 10:05:20 AM
No fault of the author, really; how many ways can you describe, in a couple of paragraphs, a golf course no one else has seen?



Rick,

Lots of ways if you are a talented writer. That's what your are supposed to be doing, taking people to places they have never seen, or will ever see.

Evan is a good guy and hired me to write for him a couple of times at another magazine, but this piece is not good. He just sucks up to a rich guy.

Anthony
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Rick Shefchik

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #32 on: February 06, 2007, 11:10:45 AM »
Anthony,

I'm not saying it's good writing. I just don't find it significantly less interesting than most of the golf writing I encounter.

There are superb golf writers out there, but most of the pieces I read about golf courses make me want to read about baseball.
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"Golf is 20 percent mechanics and technique. The other 80 percent is philosophy, humor, tragedy, romance, melodrama, companionship, camaraderie, cussedness and conversation." - Grantland Rice

Philippe Binette

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #33 on: February 06, 2007, 11:31:07 AM »
It took me a big 5 seconds on the website of one of our favorite architect to find this quote

The Santa Rosa Mountains frame this lush private course located in the XXXXXXXXX Valley in LaQuinta, California. Several hundred large palm trees along with scenic lakes, streams and magnificent waterfalls augment the playability and beauty of this outstanding venue.

lakes + streams + waterfalls = playability

name the architect
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ANTHONYPIOPPI

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #34 on: February 06, 2007, 11:37:59 AM »

Philippe:

Is the answer

              Bernhard von Limburger
                          1901-1981
« Last Edit: February 06, 2007, 11:42:32 AM by Anthony Pioppi »
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John_Cullum

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #35 on: February 06, 2007, 11:40:26 AM »
I hereby nominate The Good Doctor Returns.
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"We finally beat Medicare. "

ANTHONYPIOPPI

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #36 on: February 06, 2007, 11:41:16 AM »
Rick,

I think my problem with the article was I don't give a rat's ass about golf carts and private chefs. The fact is, though, most of the Golfweek readers  do and Evan in writing his rich-guy-for-a-day piece was serving his audience, which in the end is the object. It's just not my cup of meat, but that doesn't make it poor writing.

Anthony
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Brad Klein

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #37 on: February 06, 2007, 11:47:11 AM »
Okay, so Walter Mitty plays golf and writes it up that way. Obviously, some take offense at the style, but that's not to be mistaken for "horrible golf writing," just a style that some folks don't like.
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John Kavanaugh

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #38 on: February 06, 2007, 12:34:18 PM »
I just got the nicest email from the author of the article.  I'm hoping to have made a new friend.
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Robert Thompson

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #39 on: February 06, 2007, 12:47:23 PM »
I actually worked with Evan on one article a few years back when he was at T&L Golf. He was good to work with.

However, I hope I never see the phrase: "playable for and interesting to all types of games," ever again.

Leave that BS to the marketing types. I'm still looking for someone to say their course only suits "high handicappers," or "players who spend five hours a day honing their games." Now that would be interesting.
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Terrorizing Toronto Since 1997

Read me at Canadiangolfer.com

Jeff_Brauer

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #40 on: February 06, 2007, 01:07:03 PM »
The potential for really bad golf writing appeals to my sense of humor.  Maybe we should have a bad writing contest, or one of those serial reviews where posts build on posts.

I'll start....

"It was the best of courses, it was the worst of courses......"

Carry on......
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Jeff Brauer, ASGCA Director of Outreach

Michael Moore

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #41 on: February 06, 2007, 01:09:21 PM »
All good courses are alike; each bad course sucks in its own way.
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Metaphor is social and shares the table with the objects it intertwines and the attitudes it reconciles. Opinion, like the Michelin inspector, dines alone. - Adam Gopnik, The Table Comes First

Garland Bayley

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #42 on: February 06, 2007, 01:12:45 PM »
Yet, if I have played one bad course, I have played them all.
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"I enjoy a course where the challenges are contained WITHIN it, and recovery is part of the game  not a course where the challenge is to stay ON it." Jeff Warne

Eric Franzen

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #43 on: February 06, 2007, 01:13:43 PM »
Quote from: Jeff_Brauer on February 06, 2007, 01:07:03 PM
The potential for really bad golf writing appeals to my sense of humor.  Maybe we should have a bad writing contest, or one of those serial reviews where posts build on posts.

I'll start....

"It was the best of courses, it was the worst of courses......"

Carry on......

"No expense has been spared - ensuring this will be the greatest golf course in California... if not the world"
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Jeff_Brauer

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #44 on: February 06, 2007, 01:24:14 PM »
Well, if we are going this direction, I have posted these before, but reviewers have ways to subtly pan a course with “double entendre” phrases, without being a LIAR (i.e. Lexicon of Intentionally Ambiguous References" including:

"You’ll be lucky to enjoy this course" (it would depend on something besides design)

“I would like to enthusiastically recommend this course to you” (but I can’t)

"Best of its kind" (the bad kind)

"Never seen anything like it" (and hope not to again)

“He designed a course like he’s never designed before” (How do you mean that?)

Now, that's a golf course" (what kind?)

"I had a hard time believing what I saw."

"It redefines the meaning of a place to play golf."

"It had it all” (tee markers, flags, ball washers, the works)

"I don't usually write about clubhouses, but this one is the club’s focal point."

"It's always interesting to see a designer take chances."

"I would like to recommend this as a must play course.”  (but I just can’t)

"It proves you can build a golf course just about anywhere."

"Years from now, golf course architecture students will visit this course just to study it."

Sorry, can't resist. Carry On!

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Jeff Brauer, ASGCA Director of Outreach

Garland Bayley

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #45 on: February 06, 2007, 01:30:48 PM »
Since it was another in the Trump Empire, I was sure I had seen it all before.
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"I enjoy a course where the challenges are contained WITHIN it, and recovery is part of the game  not a course where the challenge is to stay ON it." Jeff Warne

Mike_Cirba

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #46 on: February 06, 2007, 01:30:57 PM »
It was a dark and stormy golf course...
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Garland Bayley

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #47 on: February 06, 2007, 01:31:42 PM »
Quote from: MPCirba on February 06, 2007, 01:30:57 PM
It was a dark and stormy golf course...
:P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P
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"I enjoy a course where the challenges are contained WITHIN it, and recovery is part of the game  not a course where the challenge is to stay ON it." Jeff Warne

Eric Franzen

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #48 on: February 06, 2007, 01:37:43 PM »
Quote from: MPCirba on February 06, 2007, 01:30:57 PM
It was a dark and stormy golf course...

Cirba,

This is why I am only a student while you are a master.

I am not worthy!
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Mike_Cirba

Re:Nominations for horrible golf writing.
« Reply #49 on: February 06, 2007, 01:37:55 PM »
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic golf course architect.
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