Quotes About Language

To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence, as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning of the object photographed.

All I know about grammar is its infinite power.

Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of school the year the rules were mentioned.

Lesbians discussed the dehumanizing aspect of American technology, in French.

But it should be Soon. Already I defend hotly Certain of our indefensible faults, Resent being reminded; already in my mind Our language becomes freighted with a richness No common tongue could offer, while the mountains Are like nowhere on earth, and the wide rivers.

The very language we use when we think about self-pity betrays the deep abhorrence in which we hold it: self-pity is feeling sorry for yourself, self-pity is thumb-sucking, self-pity is boo hoo poor me, self-pity is the condition in which those feeling sorry for themselves indulge, or even wallow. Self-pity remains both the most common and universally reviled of our character defects, its pestilential destructiveness accepted as given.

I am still committed to the idea that the ability to think for one's self depends upon one's mastery of the language.

There's no way I'm going to let a slang term invented by a scroungy dope dealer spoil my friend's cookie name.

Those people who say that words have no power know nothing of the nature of words. Words, well placed, can end a regime; can turn affection to hatred; can start a religion or even a war. Words are the shepherds of lies; they lead the best of us to the slaughter.

Those people who say that words have no power know nothing of the nature of words

Azok, akik szerint a szavaknak nincs hatalmuk, nincsenek tisztában a szavak természetével. A jól irányzott szavak véget vethetnek egy uralkodó rendszernek, vallást alapíthatnak vagy háborút indíthatnak. A szavak a hazugságok pásztorai, sorainkból a legjobbakat máglyára küldhetik.

The weapons an author has at her disposal are flawed. There are words that feel shapeless and overused. Love, for example. I could write the word love a thousand times and it would mean a thousand different things to different readers. What is the point of trying to put down on paper emotions that are too complex, too huge, too overwhelming to be confined by an alphabet? Love isn't the only word that fails. Hate does, too.

words are like nets - we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder.

Words are like eggs dropped from great heights; you can no more call them back than ignore the mess they leave when they fall.

There are all sorts of experiences we can't really put a name to...The birth of a child, for one. Or the death of a parent. Falling in love. Words are like nets--we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, grief, or wonder. Finding God is like that, too. If it's happened to you, you know what it feels like. But try to describe it to someone else--and language only takes you so far.

Frankly, I wonder who Frank was, and why he has an adverb all to himself.

No, he said calmly, filled with purpose. he took her arms lightly in his hands and shook her. I am not giving you up. Emily looked at him, and for just a moment he could read her thoughts. Melanie use to say they were like twins, with their own secret, silent language. in that instant, Chris felt her fear and her resignation, and the knotty pain of coming up against a brick wall again and again. She glanced away, and he could breathe again. The thing is, Chris Emily said, it's not your choice.

This was the reason there was music, he realized. There were some feelings that didn't have words big enough to describe them.

Was there a language of loss? Did everyone who suffered speak a different dialect?

The weapons an author has at her disposal are flawed. There are words that feel shapeless and overused. Love, for example. I could write the word love a thousand times and it would mean a thousand different things to different readers.

sometimes words are not big enough to contain all the feelings you are trying to pour into them.

I don't understand why people never say what they mean. It's like the immigrants who come to a country and learn the language but are completely baffled by idioms. (Seriously, how could anyone who isn't a native English speaker 'get the picture,' so to speak, and not assume it has something to do with a photo or a painting?)

Words are like nets - we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder. Like falling in love or finding god, if it ha...ppens to you, you know what it feels like. But try to describe it to someone else - and language only takes you so far.

For better or for worse, music is the language of memory. It is also the language of love.