I agree.

If you are using Word more than 6 hours a month you owe it to yourself to learn to use Styles in Word. Within two months you will more than have recovered any time you spend learning them. If you use Word more than that the savings are much more dramatic. See Understanding Styles in Microsoft Word and Yet Another "Use Styles" Verbal Beating!

I recently had occasion to edit a 100-page document that was created without using styles. It was formatted completely with direct formatting. Each page ended with a page break.

Each time it had to be saved, the save took more than 60 seconds, during which time Word was frozen. A similar-sized document formatted using Styles takes less than 3 seconds for me to save. This difference was due entirely to the document being directly formatted - a much higher level of complexity. Each paragraph mark in a directly-formatted paragraph carries with it up to fifty different formatting commands. When formatted using Styles, that paragraph mark will carry with it one command - use this style!

Failure to use styles also makes documents much more prone to corruption.

To Jim P and Charles Kenyon

Thank you both very much for your advice - and my apologies for loading such a rant in the first place: I accept this is the wrong forum for such a general anathema, and I should have thought more carefully.

I will follow up the references you have given - particularly of course Mr Kenyon's tutorial on how to use styles (when I can find the time from correcting and cursing).

Then I will probably come back with some more questions, but thanks again.