Blog travel writing is written at a personal level, it engages the reader using more common humour and relation to everyday tasks. The language is often informal and the writer uses small personal anecdotes throughout the writing, for example, ‘don’t worry mum, we scooped the ice out of every glass, just in case!’ as blogging sites are commonly used as a method of contact for relatives and friends while a person is travelling. A range of sentences are used throughout the writing, often compound and complex. However, some simple sentences are used to break up the writing and to create the text more interesting for the reader.
Humour is used in blog writing to create a relaxed and casual sense of writing. In this particular blog, a comment about the lack of seatbelts in a foreign taxi is ended with ‘the driver had one, he made sure he was safe’ this appeals to the reader and keeps them entertained and wanting to read on. The writer comments on the live music in the city,
Hyperbole is used in any writing to emphasise the intensity of the event, over-reacting to an entertaining extent. The hyperbole ‘fighting his way around a temple’ or ‘clinging for our lives’ gives the reader a more vivid image of the busy streets of Bangkok and can allow them to relate with what the writer is experiencing. In this blog the writer explains that the atmosphere ‘wasn’t our cup of tea’. Idioms can sometimes be used in travel blogging; especially if the blogger is abroad where English phrases could often be misunderstood.
In the extract from ‘down under’ by Bill Bryson, humour is the most common repeated factor. He talks to the reader, as if it isn’t a book and is just a long conversation with his friend; humour is used in many occasions throughout my extract, for example: ‘as a place that attracted American interest Australia ranked about level with Belarus and Burundi’ short and witty sentences seem to be Bryson’s skill as you continue to read the rest of the text, he