“I will remember this word," he said. "Shenanigans. It is a good word.”
John Flanagan (1873–1938) Irish-American hammer thrower
Source: The Emperor of Nihon-Ja
Quotes about wording page 22
“You know you love someone when you cannot put into words how they make you feel.”
Margaret Mead (1901–1978) American anthropologist
Alberto Manguel (1948) writer
Source: A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflections on a Year of Books
Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer
Source: Devil in Winter
David Sedaris book Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls
Variant: Their house had real hardcover books in it, and you often saw them lying open on the sofa, the words still warm from being read.
Source: Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls
“Their words, like the music, had the potential to be endless.”
Sarah Dessen book Keeping the Moon
Source: Keeping the Moon
“Words never mean what we want them to mean.”
Jonathan Safran Foer book Everything Is Illuminated
Source: Everything Is Illuminated (2002)
“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will always hurt me.”
Stephen Fry book Moab Is My Washpot
Source: Moab Is My Washpot
“Your talk," I said, "is surely the handiwork of wisdom because not one word of it do I understand.”
Flann O'Brien book The Third Policeman
Source: The Third Policeman (1967)
Jean Paul Sartre book Nausea
Variant: Most of the time, because of their failure to fasten on to words, my thoughts remain misty and nebulous. They assume vague, amusing shapes and are then swallowed up: I promptly forget them.
Source: Nausea
Rachel Caine (1962) American writer
Variant: Jackass!" Eve yelled.
"You know, when people say that, I just hear the word awesome," Shane said.
Source: Last Breath
Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist
Source: Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
Bill Watterson (1958) American comic artist
There's Treasure Everywhere
“But there are certain meanings that are lost forever the moment they are explained in words.”
Haruki Murakami book 1Q84
IQ84 (2009-2010)
Variant: It is not that the meaning cannot be explained. But there are certain meanings that are lost forever the moment they are explained in words.
Source: 1Q84
“What do you love doing so much that the words failure and success essentially become irrelevant?”
Elizabeth Gilbert Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
Source: Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
Obert Skye book Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo
Source: Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo
John Marsden book Tomorrow, When the War Began
Source: Tomorrow, When the War Began
“Let no one persuade you by word or deed to do or say whatever is not best for you.”
Pythagoras (-585–-495 BC) ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher
As quoted in Divine Harmony: The Life and Teachings of Pythagoras by John Strohmeier and Peter Westbrook. (1999)
The Golden Verses
Context: Many words befall men, mean and noble alike; do not be astonished by them, nor allow yourself to be constrained.
If a lie is told, bear with it gently.
But whatever I tell you, let it be done completely.
Let no one persuade you by word or deed to do or say whatever is not best for you.
“There. I've said everything I wanted to say without actually having to use the words "please stay”
Rachel Cohn (1968) American writer
Source: Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist
“That's all we have, finally, the words, and they had better be the right ones.”
Raymond Carver (1938–1988) American short story author and poet
Ferdinand de Saussure book Course in General Linguistics
Source: Cours de linguistique générale (1916), p. 111-112
Source: Course in General Linguistics
Context: Psychologically our thought-apart from its expression in words-is only a shapeless and indistinct mass. Philosophers and linguists have always agreed in recognizing that without the help of signs we would be unable to make a clear-cut, consistent distinction between two ideas. Without language, thought is a vague, uncharted nebula. here are no pre-existing ideas, and nothing is distinct before the appearance of language.
Guy Debord (1931–1994) French Marxist theorist, writer, filmmaker and founding member of the Situationist International (SI)
Source: Society of the Spectacle (1967), Ch. 8, sct. 207 (confer Comte de Lautréamont, Poésies II, 1870).
“I swear to you, there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell”
Walt Whitman (1819–1892) American poet, essayist and journalist
Madeleine L'Engle (1918–2007) American writer
Source: A Circle of Quiet
Anaïs Nin (1903–1977) writer of novels, short stories, and erotica
Source: Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love"--The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin
“Liberty a word without which all other words are vain.”
Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer
The trial of Charles B. Reynolds for blasphemy (1887)
Context: It is impossible that there should be such a thing as real religion without liberty. Without liberty there can be no such thing as conscience, no such word as justice. All human actions — all good, all bad — have for a foundation the idea of human liberty, and without Liberty there can be no vice, and there can be no virtue.
Without Liberty there can be no worship, no blasphemy — no love, no hatred, no justice, no progress.
Take the word Liberty from human speech and all the other words become poor, withered, meaningless sounds — but with that word realized — with that word understood, the world becomes a paradise.
Context: Liberty is the condition of progress. Without Liberty, there remains only barbarism. Without Liberty, there can be no civilization.
If another man has not the right to think, you have not even the right to think that he thinks wrong. If every man has not the right to think, the people of New Jersey had no right to make a statute, or to adopt a constitution — no jury has the right to render a verdict, and no court to pass its sentence.
In other words, without liberty of thought, no human being has the right to form a judgment. It is impossible that there should be such a thing as real religion without liberty. Without liberty there can be no such thing as conscience, no such word as justice. All human actions — all good, all bad — have for a foundation the idea of human liberty, and without Liberty there can be no vice, and there can be no virtue.
Without Liberty there can be no worship, no blasphemy — no love, no hatred, no justice, no progress.
Take the word Liberty from human speech and all the other words become poor, withered, meaningless sounds — but with that word realized — with that word understood, the world becomes a paradise.
“Freedom's just another word for "nothing left to lose".”
Kris Kristofferson (1936) American country music singer, songwriter, musician, and film actor
Song lyrics, Me and Bobby McGee (1969)
Variant: Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose
Nothing ain't worth nothing but it's free
“If I could sum it up in 50 words, I wouldn't have needed to write a whole novel about it.”
Patrick Rothfuss (1973) American fantasy writer
“Don't just learn from God's Word, but believe it will change your life.”
Joyce Meyer (1943) American author and speaker
John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet
Letter to John Taylor (February 27, 1818)
Letters (1817–1820)
Context: In Poetry I have a few axioms, and you will see how far I am from their centre. I think Poetry should surprise by a fine excess and not by singularity — it should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance — Its touches of Beauty should never be halfway thereby making the reader breathless instead of content: the rise, the progress, the setting of imagery should like the Sun come natural to him — shine over him and set soberly although in magnificence leaving him in the luxury of twilight — but it is easier to think what Poetry should be than to write it — and this leads me on to another axiom. That if Poetry comes not as naturally as the leaves to a tree it had better not come at all.
“Lightwoods,” Magnus said. “They always have to have the last word.”
Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes
Source: City of Ashes
Geoffrey Chaucer book The Canterbury Tales
General Prologue, l. 305 - 310
Source: The Canterbury Tales
Context: Of studie took he most cure and most hede.
Noght o word spak he more than was nede,
And that was seyd in forme and reverence,
And short and quik, and ful of hy sentence.
Souninge in moral vertu was his speche,
And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche.
“Culture, when it comes to food, is of course a fancy word for your mom.”
Michael Pollan (1955) American author, journalist, activist, and professor of journalism
Source: In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
John O'Donohue (1956–2008) Irish writer, priest and philosopher
Source: Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom
“I know hate is a strong word and everything, but its okay: we're teenagers.”
Cecily von Ziegesar book You Know You Love Me
Source: You Know You Love Me
Eric Hobsbawm (1917–2012) British academic historian and Marxist historiographer
Source: How to Change the World: Reflections on Marx and Marxism
Eloisa James (1962) American academic
Source: A Kiss at Midnight
“Let your actions defend you, not your words.”
Brandon Sanderson book The Way of Kings
Source: The Way of Kings
Billy Graham (1918–2018) American Christian evangelist
Source: Hope for Each Day: Words of Wisdom and Faith
