Quotes About Words

Vanessa Rey chose the words for her own headstone, taking her theme from the Bhagavad Gita. Certain is death, for the living, certain is life, for the dead. Think about that.

I collect the words unheard. I pluck them from the air, rescue them from gutters, retrieve them from branches—they don't vibrate for long after the words are spoken. I often wonder if I weren't deaf whether I'd hear them. I gather them on my morning walk, along with bottles and cans from recycling bins, and again after supper at St. Joseph's soup kitchen.

For a moment it seemed that this was the music of a song, once heard under the southern stars in a cafe-chantant, with half-absurd, half-blind, recklessly merry words (146)

And then we had one of those conversations which make no sense on paper, which you can't repeat and can't even remember. The sounds mean more than the words, like in an Italian opera.

Culture is perishing in overproduction, in an avalanche of words, in the madness of quantity.

For everyone is pained by the thought of disappearing, unheard and unseen, into an indifferent universe, and because of that everyone wants, while there is still time, to turn himself into a universe of words.

Dictionary of Misunderstood Words

political movements rest not so much on rational attitudes as on fantasies, images, words, and archetypes that come together to make up this or that political kitsch.

Promatra njihova usta koja se otvaraju sva istodobno, usta koja melju, izbacuju rije?i i bez prestanka praskaju u smijeh (zagonetka: kako se žene koje se me?usobno ne slušaju mogu smijati onome što govore?).

And suddenly he realized that all his life he had done nothing but talk, write, lecture, concoct sentences, search for formulations and amend them, so in the end no words were precise, their meanings were obliterated, their meaning lost, they turned into trash, chaff, dust, sand; prowling through his brain, tearing at his head, they were his insomnia, his illness.

Genij lirike je genij neiskustva. Pjesnik ne zna mnogo o svijetu, ali rije?i koje teku iz njega svrstavaju se u prekrasne skupine, kona?ne kao kristal. Pjesnik je nezreo ?ovjek, ali njegov stih nosi u sebi mo? proro?anstva pred kojim i sam ostaje zapanjen.

O amor começa com uma metáfora. Ou, por outras palavras, o amor começa no preciso instante em que, com uma das suas palavras, uma mulher se inscreve na nossa memória poética.

Everyone has trouble accepting the fact he will disappear unheard of and unnoticed in an indifferent universe, and everyone wants to make himself into a universe of words before it's too late.

Die deutsche Sprache ist die Sprache der schweren Wörter

He was afraid to say it, because everything he had said so far failed to come out as intended, and these sincere words, too, would sound sarcastic to his colleague.

Since the days of the French Revolution, one half of Europe has been referred to as the left, the other half as the right. Yet to define one or the other by means of the theoretical principles it professes is all but impossible. And no wonder: political movements rest not so much on rational attitudes as on the fantasies, images, words, and archetypes that come together to make up this or that political kitsch.

The only place success comes before is in the dictionary

I love the language. I'm just totally fascinated by the sound and the look of words and the kinds of cadences you can create with them, the various kinds of music.

What you're thinking, what you're saying, what you're doing, is having an impact on you and the people around you

Pleasant words are the food of love.

To elevate abstract doctrines and dogmas over living, breathing, embodied experiences of God's love and grace, then, is going the wrong direction. It's taking flesh and turning it back into words.

When words we want, love teacheth to indite; And what we blush to speak, she bids us write.

I love doing my surreal sing-along that had words that no one could follow.

The words. I love words. I love to write. Being an artist is what I love.