“Words are your business, boy. Not just the word. Words are everything. The key to the rock, the answer to the question.”

—  Ralph Ellison

Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Words are your business, boy. Not just the word. Words are everything. The key to the rock, the answer to the question." by Ralph Ellison?
Ralph Ellison photo
Ralph Ellison82
American novelist, literary critic, scholar and writer 1914–1994

Related quotes

Steve Martin photo

“Boy, those French! They have a different word for everything.”

Steve Martin (1945) American actor, comedian, musician, author, playwright, and producer

W.E.B. Du Bois photo

“To the real question, How does it feel to be a problem? I answer seldom a word.”

W.E.B. Du Bois book The Souls of Black Folk

Source: The Souls of Black Folk

Milan Kundera photo

“A question with no answer is a barrier that cannot be breached. In other words, it is questions with no answers that set the limits of human possibilities, describe the boundaries of human existence.”

Milan Kundera book The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Source: The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“Your thoughts and words create everything.”

Ralph Smart

Derren Brown photo

“(In answer to the question ‘How would you describe yourself in three words?’) Short and balding.”

Derren Brown (1971) British illusionist

TV Series and Specials (Includes DVDs), Mind Control (1999–2000) or Inside Your Mind on DVD

Reggie Fils-Aimé photo

“The key here are two little words: the word 'or' and the word 'and'. Nintendo is not an or company, with games devoted to just this group or that group. We're an and company, with games for this group and that group and for groups that don't even call themselves gamers yet.”

Reggie Fils-Aimé (1961) American businessman

On market expansion
Source: E3 2005

Elias Canetti photo

“Is there still a possibility of public truth?
The prime condition for that would be that you pose your own questions, not just answer them. The questions of others have a distorting influence, one adapts to them, accepts words and concepts that should be avoided at all costs.
Ideally, you should use only words which you have filled with new meaning.”

Elias Canetti (1905–1994) Bulgarian-born Swiss and British jewish modernist novelist, playwright, memoirist, and non-fiction writer

J. Agee, trans. (1989), p. 5
Das Geheimherz der Uhr [The Secret Heart of the Clock] (1987)

Ludwig Wittgenstein photo

“Your questions refer to words; so I have to talk about words.
You say: The point isn't the word, but its meaning, and you think of the meaning as a thing of the same kind as the word, though also different from the word. Here the word, there the meaning.”

Ludwig Wittgenstein book Philosophical Investigations

§ 120
Philosophical Investigations (1953)

Louise Jameson photo

“Really to immobilise your face when you’re in the business of communicating is an oxymoron…is that the right word? It just doesn’t seem to make sense.”

Louise Jameson (1951) English actress

The Den of Geek interview: Louise Jameson https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/the-den-of-geek-interview-louise-jameson/ (February 14, 2008)

Stephen King photo

“Somehow the word started coming back - some people still had breath to spare, apparently. The word was this hill was a quarter of a mile long. The word was it was two miles long. The word was that no Walker had ever gotten a ticket on this hill. The word was that three boys had gotten tickets here just last year. And after that, the word stopped coming back.”

Stephen King book The Long Walk

The Long Walk (1979)

Related topics