Quotes About Language

Be aware that every word you know is going to try to sneak into your manuscript.

When asked by an English poet who was at the table to read the ancient couplet Discite grammatici cur mascula nomina cunnus/ Et cur femineum mentula nomen habet -Teach us, grammarians, why vagina (cunnus) is a masculine noun/ And why penis (mentula) is feminine –Giacomo answered it with a witty pentameter of his own invention: Disce quod a domino nomina servus habet -It is because the slave always takes the name of his master.

Thats not a bad word, hate and war are bad words, fuck isnt.

I've been trying to train my cat to understand the meaning of the word "no." Which seems to be roughly equivalent to teaching a dog Latin.

the poet speaks not only 'on the threshold of being', as Gaston Bachelard notes,43 but also on the threshold of language. Equally, the task of art and architecture in general is to reconstruct the experience of an undifferentiated interior world, in which we are not mere spectators, but to which we inseparably belong.

Sanatsal d??avurum, dünyan?n söz-öncesi anlamlar?yla, basitçe entelektüel olarak anla??lmaktan ziyade bedenle bütünle?mi? ve ya?anm?? anlamlarla, iç içedir.

I used to think I was poor. Then they told me I wasn't poor, I was needy. Then they told me it was self-defeating to think of myself as needy, I was deprived. Then they told me underpriviledged was overused, I was disadvantaged. I still don't have a dime, but I have a great vocabulary.

Writing is a way of talking without being interrupted.

Ajouter deux lettres à Paris, c'est le paradis.

Ecrire, c'est une façon de parler sans être interrompu. (Writing, it's a way of speaking without being interrupted.)

L'accent circonflexe est l'hirondelle de l'écriture.

Ich bilde schon lange keine Meinungen mehr. Ich sage Dinge, weil sie besser klingen als andere, die ich ebenfalls hätte sagen können.

Das Recht ist kein Kreißsaal für die Gerechtigkeit und hat niemals behauptet, einer zu sein. Das Recht besteht aus Gesetzen, Gesetze bestehen aus Wörtern, und Wörter können manches sein, sicher aber nicht gerecht.

Am Anfang war das Wort, am Ende das Ding.

It's quite simple," she says, while Rosentreter wonders, not without anxiety, whether she can read his thoughts. "You draw air into your lungs, you raise your soft palate, air passes over your vocal cords, and you move your lips and tongue. Or, to put it another way, you speak.

Love in any language, Straight from the heart, Pulls us all together, Never apart.

I see you are already learning our beautiful language.

How's your Latin?' asked Charlie. 'Non-existent.' 'Well, you might find the next class a bit tough then.

The work of art that insures the rebirth of its author and its reader or viewer is one that succeeds in integrating the artificial language it puts forward (ne style, new composition, surprising imagination) and the unnamed agitations [Émois] of an omnipotent self that ordinary social and linguistic usage always leave somewhat orphaned or plunged into mourning. Hence such a fiction, if it isn't an antidepressant, is at least, a survival, a resurrection.

No concebía oficio más hermoso que el de sumergirse en los mares que forman las palabras.

Language forces us to perceive the world as man presents it to us.

Hyacinth," Lady Bridgerton said in a vaguely disapproving voice, "do try to speak in complete sentences." Hyacinth looked at her mother with a surprised expression. "Biscuits. Are. Good." She cocked her head to the side. "Noun. Verb. Adjective." "Hyacinth." "Noun. Verb. Adjective." Colin said, wiping a crumb from his grinning face. "Sentence. Is. Correct.

He sucked his lips in an attempt not to laugh. "Aren't you Spanish?" She raised one arm in a salute. "Viva la Queen Isabella!" "I see. Then why are you speaking with a French accent?

There," she said triumphantly. "Like that." He began to wonder if they were speaking the same language. "Like what?" "That! What you just said." He crossed his arms. It seemed the only acceptable reply. If she couldn't speak in complete sentences, he saw no reason why he had to speak at all.