Quotes About Language

Once you gave a thing a name, you gave it life.

a metaphor ... is like lying but more decorative.

Letitia! What a name. Halfway between a salad and a sneeze.

Y'know,' he said, 'it's very hard to talk quantum using a language originally designed to tell other monkeys where the ripe fruit is.

It as true that normal people couldn't hear Gaspode speak, because dogs don't speak. It's a well know fact. ... Besides, almost all dogs don't talk. Ones that do are merely a statistical error, and can therefore be ignored.

Occasionally he would very nearly swear.

A metaphor is a kind o' lie to help people understand what's true.

I imagine that fish have no word for water.

ASTONISHING, said Death. REALLY ASTONISHING. LET ME PUT FORWARD ANOTHER SUGGESTION: THAT YOU ARE NOTHING MORE THAN A LUCKY SPECIES OF APE THAT IS TRYING TO UNDERSTAND THE COMPLEXITIES OF CREATION VIA A LANGUAGE THAT EVOLVED IN ORDER TO TELL ONE ANOTHER WHERE THE RIPE FRUIT WAS.

All things are defined by names. Change the name, and you change the thing.

Slave is an Ephebian word. In Om we have no word for slave,' said Vorbis. 'So I understand,' said the Tyrant. 'I imagine that fish have no word for water.

Words have always had the power to change the world.

There was never anything to be gained from observing what humans said to one another--language was just there to hide their thoughts.

As they say in Discworld, we are trying to unravel the Mighty Infinite using a language which was designed to tell one another where the fresh fruit was.

It must be powerful language if you canna make oout what the heel it's goin' on aboot!

I just rearrange words into a pleasing order for money.

She'd read the dictionary all the way through. No one told her you weren't supposed to.

Bad spelling can be lethal.

All witches who'd lived in her cottage were bookish types. They thought you could see life through books but you couldn't, the reason being that the words got in the way.

Words are the litmus paper of the minds. If you find yourself in the power of someone who will use the word commence in cold blood, go somewhere else very quickly. But if they say Enter, don't stop to pack.

There's some things we can't think because we don't know the words.

a man needs no camel to ride to hell, yea, nor horse, nor mule; a man may ride into hell on his tongue...

Keep your vocabulary as wide as you can. I have some difficulty with the word 'cool', and I'm not too bothered about the word 'awesome'. People like me are looking to people like you guys of the next generation to deal with this shit. It's like seeing a rock guitarist pick up a Fender Stratocaster and hold it the wrong way.

Once you gave a thing a name you gave it a life.