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Jim Harrison 20
American novelist, poet, essayist 1937–2016Related quotes
“Language is often changed by writers.”
Acceptance Speech for the Margaret Edwards Award (1998)
Context: Language is often changed by writers. We speak English today because Chaucer chose to write in the language of the common people, rather than the Latin or French used by those who were educated. James Joyce had an almost equally profound effect on language when he wrote about the inner self, rather than the outer self.
“Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; the best of life is but intoxication.”
“Good writers are those who keep the language efficient.”
Source: ABC of Reading (1934), Chapter 3
Context: Good writers are those who keep the language efficient. That is to say, keep it accurate, keep it clear.
“For a writer, to change languages is to write a love letter with a dictionary.”
Anathemas and Admirations (1987)
“writers are desperate people and when they stop being desperate they stop being writers.”
Book One, Chapter XIII.
Democracy in America, Volume II (1840), Book One
<span class="plainlinks"> Foreword, 'Tales of Transformation: English Translation of Tagore's Chitrangada and Chandalika', Lopamudra Banerjee, (2018). https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07DQPD8F4/</span>
From Prose
“For a writer, only one form of patriotism exists: his attitude toward language.”