Why say “never fails to disappoint” if what you mean “is reliably excellent”?
You probably meant something more like ‘never fails to excite’ or some antonym of ‘disappoint’. Perhaps a good example of using too many layers of negation causing confusion.
Nancy was quoting the review given as an example of shooting yourself in the foot with too many layers in the linked Language Log post. The author of this review meant “is reliably excellent” and wrote “never fails to disappoint”.
You probably meant something more like ‘never fails to excite’ or some antonym of ‘disappoint’. Perhaps a good example of using too many layers of negation causing confusion.
Nancy was quoting the review given as an example of shooting yourself in the foot with too many layers in the linked Language Log post. The author of this review meant “is reliably excellent” and wrote “never fails to disappoint”.
D’oh!. If I’d read the linked content first, I’d have understood the context that was being quoted there.