“Human suffering has been caused because too many of us cannot grasp that words are only tools for our use, and that… — Richard Dawkins Copy Share Image
I do love perusing the dictionary to find how many words I don't use - words that have specific, sharp, focused meaning.… — Geoffrey Rush Copy Share Image
In how few words, for instance, the Greeks would have told the story of Abelard and Heloise, making but a sentence of… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
My favorite books are a constantly changing list, but one favorite has remained constant: the dictionary. Is the word I want to… — Beverly Cleary Copy Share Image
Then idiots talk…of Energy. If there is a word in the dictionary under any letter from A to Z that I abominate,… — Charles Dickens Copy Share Image
The New Oxford Dictionary has declared Sarah Palin's word 'refudiate' to be the 2010 Word of the Year. Palin was honored and… — Conan O'Brien Copy Share Image
And people get all fouled up because they want the world to have meaning as if it were words... As if you… — Anonymous Copy Share Image
Most of my library consists of books on the Catholic faith: conversion stories, books on saints and Early Church Fathers, Apparitions of… — Gail Buckley Copy Share Image
It's difficult to sit down and write a letter back saying, "you know what, even if we remove the word from the… — Kory Stamper Copy Share Image
Everything starts somewhere, though many physicists disagree. But people have always been dimly aware of the problem with the start of things.… — Terry Pratchett Copy Share Image
There is a certain blend of courage, integrity, character and principle which has no satisfactory dictionary name but has been called different… — Louis Adamic Copy Share Image
I will use big words from time to time, the meanings of which I may only vaguely perceive, in hopes such cupidity… — Harlan Ellison Copy Share Image
The Beatles did everything long before anyone else. They weren't afraid to try things and to experiment with a lot of sounds.… — Joe Perry Copy Share Image
I had a cousin once who lived in your dictionary, inside the binding, and there was a tiny hole which he used… — Janet Frame Copy Share Image
My erotic poetry is not poetry that uses vernacular words. It is a very erotic poetry, but I never use anything, for… — Maria Teresa Horta Copy Share Image
With "marriage," the word gets applied to same-sex marriages by proponents and opponents alike. That means the word itself is changing, and… — Kory Stamper Copy Share Image
I speak from the heart. Certain people follow lyricists and people that put words on a dictionary together, and this and that.… — French Montana Copy Share Image
If you just open your dictionary, "morality" is the sense that separates good from evil. And if you really want to see… — Gaspar Noe Copy Share Image
And no, I'm not a walking C++ dictionary. I do not keep every technical detail in my head at all times. If… — Bjarne Stroustrup Copy Share Image
The English language has about 450,000 commonly used words, but more may be needed. What to you call someone who has lost… — Jeffrey Zaslow Copy Share Image
Hash, x. There is no definition for this word - nobody knows what hash is. Famous, adj. Conspicuously miserable. Dictionary, n. A… — Ambrose Bierce Copy Share Image
It is seldom right to say that anything is true 'according to Google.' Google is the oracle of redirection. Go there for… — James Gleick Copy Share Image
There's a measure of prescriptivism and descriptivism in every dictionary. Prescriptivism believes that the language should mirror the best practices of English,… — Kory Stamper Copy Share Image
Actually if a writer needs a dictionary he should not write. He should have read the dictionary at least three times from… — Ernest Hemingway Copy Share Image
The struggle of literature is in fact a struggle to escape from the confines of language; it stretches out from the utmost… — Italo Calvino Copy Share Image
Any grand new dictionary ought itself to be a democratic product, a book that demonstrated the primacy of individual freedoms, of the… — Simon Winchester Copy Share Image
Usually I try to be there by six. Everything has been taken off the walls so that there's nothing to arrest my… — Toni Morrison Copy Share Image
“My life is absolutely meaningless. When I consider the different periods into which it falls, it seems like the word Schnur in… — Anonymous Copy Share Image
Often, I grow irritated before the first tile has been placed on the Scrabble board. This generally occurs when one of my… — Craig Brown Copy Share Image
I call myself a radical conservative. What's that? Well, let's analyze it. Go to the dictionary. Radical: One who gets to the… — Studs Terkel Copy Share Image
