Speak English

Quick, what's the meaning of chthonic? You have no idea, right? I still don't, and I just looked it up in the dictionary. But there it was, stuck in the middle of an otherwise perfectly good sentence in a review of a movie about false pretense in the good old New York Times, like a film critic is William Shakespeare all of a sudden.

I hate when a mundane writer tries to impress me with his logorrhea. It is just unnecessary, and something to be avoided at all costs, especially when you are trying to educate the masses, such as newspaper readers. If you are writing for a specialized audience, fine, go ahead with words like toothsome and puissant--otherwise just say what you mean in language I understand. After all, the goal of writing is communication. (Sorry about the logorrhea, I just couldn't help myself.)