2,489 Quotes About Language

But the Hebrew word, the word timshel—‘Thou mayest’— that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if ‘Thou mayest’—it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.

To creative people, the compendium of the white man's dialect are unfashionable, because their creations are more than what the tongue could say.

My dear friend, clear your mind of cant [excessive thought]. You may talk as other people do: you may say to a man, "Sir, I am your most humble servant." You are not his most humble servant. You may say, "These are bad times; it is a melancholy thing to be reserved to such times." You don't mind the times ... You may talk in this manner; it is a mode of talking in Society; but don't think foolishly.

Everyone smiles in the same language, Happiness knows no frontiers, no age. No difference thar makes us feel apart if a smile can win even a broken heart.

Society was to decide a common currency so that we could use it to buy things as per ourunique needs. But now our needs are also being decided by society.Society was to decide a common language so that we could use it to talk about our unique feelings. But now we only talk about agendas and fads set by society.

Prose: words in their best order; poetry: the best words in the best order.

Keep your language. Love its sounds, its modulation, its rhythm. But try to march together with men of different languages, remote from your own, who wish like you for a more just and human world.

I know all those words, but that sentence makes no sense to me.

We have a language that is full of ambiguities; we have a way of expressing ourselves that is often complex and elusive, poetic and modulated; all our thoughts can be rendered with absolute clarity if we bother to put the right dots and squiggles between the words in the right places. Proper punctuation is both the sign and the cause of clear thinking. If it goes, the degree of intellectual impoverishment we face is unimaginable.