Quotes about semicolon

A collection of quotes on the topic of semicolon, use.

Quotes about semicolon

“Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college.”

Kurt Vonnegut book A Man Without a Country

A close paraphrase of this (beginning "Do not use...") is repeated in a commencement address at Cloves Hall, 27 April 2007, as reprinted in Armageddon in Retrospect
A Man Without a Country (2005)

“What the semicolon's anxious supporters fret about is the tendency of contemporary writers to use a dash instead of a semicolon and thus precipitate the end of the world. Are they being alarmist?”

Lynne Truss (1955) British writer

Source: Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation

World, Support

“That should probably be written: no!@#$%^&*:@! semicolon”

Larry Wall (1954) American computer programmer and author, creator of Perl

[199710161841.LAA13208@wall.org, 1997]
Usenet postings, 1997

“Whoever decided to use the semicolon to end something should just be taken out and have his colon semified. (At least COBOL and SQL managed to use a period.)”

Erik Naggum (1965–2009) Norwegian computer programmer

Re: Read table modification question. http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/e41a53e66cc1572f (Usenet article). <br class="br">Usenet articles, Miscellaneous

“To one who has enjoyed the full life of any scene, of any hour, what thoughts can be recorded about it, seem like the commas and semicolons in the paragraph, mere stops.”

Margaret Fuller (1810–1850) American feminist, poet, author, and activist

Source: , in 1843 (1844), p. 10.

Life