“If only there were a lexicographer of Liang Shih-ch'iu's ability who also had the perspicuity to arrange his dictionary by sound rather than radical! … No wonder most of us are so sour and gray by the time we reach fifty! The amount of time consumed and the spirit expended in this sort of meaningless, not to mention destructive, type of activity is beyond calculation.”
The Need for an Alphabetically Arranged General Usage Dictionary of Mandarin Chinese (February 1986).
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Victor H. Mair5
American sinologist and linguist 1943Related quotes
“LEXICOGRAPHER — A writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge.”
Samuel Johnson book A Dictionary of the English Language
A Dictionary of the English Language (1755)
Edward Abbey book Desert Solitaire
"Down the River", p. 147
Desert Solitaire (1968)
“Bewildered is the fox who lives to find that grapes beyond reach can be really sour.”
Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) American poet, short story writer, critic and satirist
Source: The Collected Dorothy Parker
David Whitmer (1805–1888) Book of Mormon witness
Letter of David Whitmer to Anthony Metcalf, March 1887. Quoted in Richard Lloyd Anderson, Investigating the Book of Mormon Witnesses (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Company, 1981), p. 86.
George S. Patton (1885–1945) United States Army general
As quoted in Liberalism is a Mental Disorder : Savage Solutions (2005) by Michael Savage, Ch. 1 : More Patton, Less Patent Leather, p. 4
John Cage (1912–1992) American avant-garde composer
1930s
Source: 'The Future of Music: Credo' (1937); in: 'Silence: lectures and writings by Cage, John', Publisher Middletown, Conn. Wesleyan University Press, June 1961, 4/SILENCE
Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo
Source: On the Edge