“It’s Like An Essay, But An Essay “On Crack!””

“TheNervousBreakdown.com is like a writer’s collective, but a writer’s collective on crack!” – Thomas Wood (to no one in particular)- Few linguistic formulas have enjoyed such success as the “…on crack” metaphor. Type “on crack” into any blog search and you’ll find millions of entries of people comparing myriad subjects to their potential in an intoxicated state. I wanted to look into this curious figure of speech, see how it works, examine some of its examples, and take a look at the cost of doing drugs, linguistically speaking.

How does this metaphor work? The formula is commonly expressed as, “It was like such-and-such, but such-and-such on [specify drug].” It relies upon the simple premise that drugs make things more interesting and more relatable. You don’t have to enjoy drugs to appreciate that they have a profound effect.

The metaphor benefits from being simple and efficient. Let’s say you want to describe your recent experience with a wolverine to someone who has had no experience with wolverines. What’s the best way to go about this?

You could spend minutes going through the animal’s taxonomy, its qualities as a forager and sometimes predator, even expound on subtle observations of its behavior as made by the great Sir David Attenborough. But describing something in such terms takes knowledge of the animal, a measure of observational prowess, and some degree of creativity. Not everyone has the skill or the resources to invest in a comprehensive description.

Instead of the full wolverine description, you could take a common, easily understood object, such as a cat, and choose an appropriately modifying drug:”Yeah, so I was being chased by this wolverine. What’s a wolverine? It’s like a cat, but a cat on crack!”

With only limited and stereotypical knowledge, any listener can immediately conjure some cat-like mammal given a dose of the mania-inducing drug. They understand that this is no gentle pussycat. They imagine that it is quick and capricious and capable of ferocity at any given moment. In short, they have pretty adequately imagined a wolverine, or at least as much as needed to understand the context of the story.

Please read the rest of this essay at TheNervousBreakdown.com