Grandiloquent is the adjective form of the noun grandiloquence, which means, “a lofty, extravagantly colorful, pompous, or bombastic style, manner, or quality—especially in language.” (Merriam-Webster)

From that Merriam-Webster page, we learn that it’s one of many English words descended from the Latin verb loqui, meaning “to speak.” To be grandiloquent is, in short, to speak with your whole chest. 

Grandiloquence is an attempt at style points, whether rhetorical, theatrical, or plain ole peacocking. The word often gets lumped in with highfalutin, a cousin in the family of linguistic ostentation, but with more rust-belt twang. Where grandiloquent suggests a ceremonial flourish, highfalutin implies a delusion of grandeur in the middle of a barn dance.

But in a world with texting and tweets being common forms of communication, grandiloquence has fallen out of favor. Most modern readers don’t come seeking fireworks in prose unless they’ve already handed over their trust to a literary juggernaut or a charismatic orator whose reputation justifies the indulgence. Grandiloquence is tolerated when it’s a known feature of the performance, not a bug.

Yet for years, my own writing reveled in it. I overfed every sentence like a doting grandmother. I’d be stuffing prose with colorful metaphors and bombastic sarcasm like it was a Thanksgiving turkey. The more colorful, the better. Subtlety was for cowards. I saw concision as a modern illness. Irony became my most essential seasoning. For a while, grandiloquence was my identity on the page, not just a style I adopted.

Then I gave it up. Or rather, I set it down like a sequined rainbow-colored cape I didn’t quite know how to wear anymore. I traded that persona for something leaner, meaner, and sparkling — straight-shooting essays and articles. I got tired of dressing up every idea like it was headed to a masquerade ball. I wanted to strip things down and talk plainly. I needed to let meaning speak louder than metaphor. Now, I’m writing straight-up definition essays, communing with language in a way I haven’t since my college years.

But in my college days, my grandiloquence wasn’t just indulgence. It became a shield for me, one I used to smuggle hard truths past the defenses of readers who didn’t want to hear them. If I wrapped the jagged parts in metaphor and draped the whole thing in velvet phrasing, maybe they’d let it through. Many of my essays were considered a rude form of performance art, not the critiques of society and humanity they were meant to be. 

I’ll freely admit now that part of me just wanted to seem smarter than the average bear. If someone didn’t get what I was saying, I could tell myself it was because they weren’t willing to meet me on the high wire. It was easier than facing the fact that I might not really be speaking to them. So my writing turned into a sort of circus act, trying to sound impressive enough that I didn’t have to be relatable. It was a sort of self-defense mechanism, constantly telling myself it wasn’t my fault if the readers didn’t get it. They’d have to come up to my level. It was rather pompous and I’m not proud of ever having that attitude.

Eventually, though, the weight of that voice wore me down. Grandiloquence didn’t give me power anymore; it felt like insulation that was keeping too much heat in during a heat wave. I could hear myself, but clearly few others could. Also, I had bills to pay. So I stripped it down, got “practical,” and started writing for the web: punchy intros, tight structure, and fifth-grade reading level. I gave up the frills and flourishes, trading them for methodical SEO compliance and client satisfaction. After all, there’s only so much you can do style-wise when you’re writing to sell building materials and kitchen & bath remodels.

For a while, I was good at it; too good for my own good, maybe. The precision of plain language eventually became a cage. I began forgetting what it felt like to love a word just because it was absurdly beautiful, or obscure, or weirdly perfect to me at that moment. My personal voice atrophied under the weight of all that professional optimization. It’s taken me the better part of a decade to claw it back.

That’s why I started Recalibrate, this definition essay series: to love writing again for its own sake. I don’t wish to revert to either the grandiloquent or mechanical version of my writing, but to realign with my own personality. I don’t want to go back to being the linguistic equivalent of a parade float, but I do want to remember what it felt like to care about vocabulary as something more than a readability score. 

I need to let myself write with my full voice again, reintegrating all the nuance, rhythm, and rhetorical excess I used to treat as sacred expressive tools. I’ve become a far better editor in the past decade, so I know when to trim back the fat and insert more heart and soul. Still, it’s taken me years of being away from the freelance content creation grind to get to this point. I can finally trust myself again that I can be both understood and heard, without also shrinking myself to be more digestible.

So, through choosing some rather unusual words to title these essays, and breaking them down into clearer definitions, I’m reclaiming the parts of grandiloquence that served something greater than my fragile ego. I’m giving myself and readers alike the invitation to slow down and sit with a sentence instead of skimming to the Call-to-Action.

I want to remind myself, and anyone who reads this little series, that every once in a while, a word like grandiloquent is the right word. I’m not choosing these words because they’re flashy, but because they contain hints of the truths I feel compelled to convey in a way no simpler word can. At this point, especially without the added pressure of any necessary financial reward, I’d rather risk being misunderstood for saying something I truly mean than be perfectly clear while saying nothing at all.

Still, every so often, I miss that grandiloquent queen of digressions and delicious excess. She wasn’t always easy to read, but she sure as hell was fun to write. Well, I still tend to digress. I don’t think that’s ever going to change.

~ Amelia Desertsong