“Proper words in proper places make the true definition of style” Jonathan Swift 1667–1745“Words are wise men's counters, they do but reckon with them, but they are the money of fools” Thomas Hobbes 1588–1679“If language is not correct, then what is said is not what is meant, if what is said is not what is meant, then what ought to be done remains undone”Confucius

From time to time someone makes us think about the way that doctors speak and write English, both in note taking and in writing for publications. Asher “revelled in the clinical paradox and the unusual; delighted in poking fun at authority and pomposity; a modern Don Quixote.”1 He opened our eyes to how medical authors are adept at using arcane words and jargon, mixing them in unwieldy sentences and tendentiously wrapping them up in obfuscating verbosity (there I go again!).

Asher followed Gowers, Swift, Confucius, and many others who have tried to improve communication by saying less …