WORDS QUOTES XIII

quotations about words

The written word has this advantage, that it lasts and can await the time when it is allowed to take effect.

JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE

The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe

Tags: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe


Words form the thread on which we string our experiences.

ALDOUS HUXLEY

The Olive Tree


Certain individual words do possess more pitch, more radiance, more shazam! than others, but it's the way words are juxtaposed with other words in a phrase or sentence that can create magic. Perhaps literally. The word "grammar," like its sister word "glamour," is actually derived from an old Scottish word that meant "sorcery." When we were made to diagram sentences in high school, we were unwittingly being instructed in syntax sorcery, in wizardry. We were all enrolled at Hogwarts. Who knew?

TOM ROBBINS

interview, Reality Sandwich

Tags: Tom Robbins


Life is like that, full of words that are not worth saying or that were worth saying once but not any more, each word that we utter will take up the space of another more deserving word not deserving in its own right, but because of the possible consequences of saying it.

JOSÉ SARAMAGO

The Cave


Words never can express the whole that we feel: they give but an outline.

ELIZA COOK

Diamond Dust

Tags: Eliza Cook


If words suffice not, blows must follow.

AESOP

"The Farmer and the Cranes", Aesop's Fables

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It seems that slang words are generated much more quickly in the Internet era, with memes pushing all sorts of words out into the world for quick consumption and even quicker disappearance. After a short space of time, these words are quickly replaced by a new wave of memes, and the cycle begins once again. But while I'm glad that slang words like "on fleek" and "bae" are slowly tapering out, I hope that phrases like "throwing shade" and "yas queen" stick around until I'm old and gray, so I can say them to children without sounding like an outdated relic. Because, you know, those are my priorities.

MEHAK ANWAR

"5 Slang Words That Will Never Go Out Of Style, Because It's Always Been Cool To Say 'Cool'", Bustle, February 10, 2016


Words are not the end of thought, they are where it begins.

JANE HIRSHFIELD

"After Long Silence"

Tags: Jane Hirshfield


The act of saying that things exist that cannot be described in words shakes a universe where words are the supreme belief.

FRANK HERBERT

Heretics of Dune


You will hear words
old and spent and useless
like costumes left over
from yesterday's parties.

CESARE PAVESE

"The Cats Will Know"


Don't gobblefunk around with words.

ROALD DAHL

The BFG

Tags: Roald Dahl


Articulate words are a harsh clamor and dissonance. When man arrives at his highest perfection, he will again be dumb! for I suppose he was dumb at the Creation, and must go round an entire circle in order to return to that blessed state.

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

American Note-Books, April 1841

Tags: Nathaniel Hawthorne


You take many words to say simple things.

LILLIAN HELLMAN

The Autumn Garden

Tags: Lillian Hellman


Superfluous words simply spill out when the mind is already full.

HORACE

Ars Poetica

Tags: Horace


Rigour and purity in assembling words, however simple the result, create a vacuum.

THEODOR W. ADORNO

Minima Moralia


Into the vortex of this sea of messaging comes not an afterthought but very possibly the cause, the universal values that are necessary for a world tied together by what? By words. Words are not dying now, merely moving forward. Books are not dying. "In the beginning was the word" suggests that very foundation of reality begins with how we see and express it.

STEPHEN C. ROSE

"Cybercommunities will require a revolution based on messaging", Blasting News, April 3, 2017


Walk with me world, upon my right hand walk, speak to me Babel, that I may strive to assemble of all these syllables a single word before the purpose of speech is gone.

CONRAD AIKEN

"This Image or Another"

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Wondrous depth of Thy words! whose surface, behold! is before us, inviting to little ones; yet are they a wondrous depth. O my God, a wondrous depth! It is awful to look therein; an awfulness of honor, and a trembling of love.

ST. AUGUSTINE

Confessions

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Into the cities my people had gathered. They had become dizzy with words. Words had choked them. They could not breathe.

SHERWOOD ANDERSON

"The Cornfields", Mid-American Chants

Tags: Sherwood Anderson


Too many words cheapened the value of a man's speech.

PATRICIA BRIGGS

Raven's Shadow

Tags: Patricia Briggs