Language Quotes by Mark Twain

“Loose and forbear!”

— Mark Twain

There are German songs which can make a stranger to the language cry.

— Mark Twain

Drawing on my fine command of language, I said nothing.

— Mark Twain

I respect a man who knows how to spell a word more than one way.

— Mark Twain

“Some German words are so long that they have a perspective.”

— Mark Twain

Kindness is a language which the deaf can hear, and the blind can read

— Mark Twain

Kindness is a language which deaf can hear and blind can see.

— Mark Twain

Kindness is a language herd by deaf men and felt by blind men.

— Mark Twain

I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way.

— Mark Twain

I can understand German as well as the maniac that invented it, but I talk it best through an interpreter.

— Mark Twain

[On Dutch flat poetry]: It is too smooth and blubbery; it reads like butter-milk gurgling from a jug.

— Mark Twain

There is no such thing as the Queen's English. The property has gone into the hands of a joint stock company and…

— Mark Twain

Never knew before what eternity was made for. It is to give some of us a chance to learn German.

— Mark Twain

If you don't know how to pronounce a word, say it loudly. Do not compound mispronunciation with inaudibility

— Mark Twain

... the English alphabet is pure insanity..., It can hardly spell any word in the language with any degree of certainty.

— Mark Twain

The existing phrasebooks are inadequate. They are well enough as far as they go, but when you fall down and skin your…

— Mark Twain

Work and play are words used to describe the same thing under differing conditions.

— Mark Twain

...the circumstances and the atmosphere always have so much to do in directing a conversation, especially a German conversation, which is only…

— Mark Twain

I don't speak German well but several experts have assured me that I write it like an angel. Maybe so, maybe so-…

— Mark Twain

It's awful undermining to the intellect, German is; you want to take it in small doses, or first you know your brains…

— Mark Twain

I would not rob you of your food or your clothes or your umbrella, but if I caught your German out I…

— Mark Twain

The Germans are exceedingly fond of Rhine wines; they are put up in tall, slender bottles, and are considered a pleasant beverage.…

— Mark Twain

“Occasionally, merely for the pleasure of being cruel, we put unoffending Frenchmen on the rack with questions framed in the incomprehensible jargon…

— Mark Twain

It is easier for a cannibal to enter the Kingdom of Heaven through the eye of a rich man's needle that it…

— Mark Twain

Whenever we come upon one of those intensely right words in a book or a newspaper the resulting effect is physical as…

— Mark Twain

An average English word is four letters and a half. By hard, honest labor I've dug all the large words out of…

— Mark Twain

By reading keep in a state of excited igorance, like a blind man in a house afire; flounder around, immensely but unintelligently…

— Mark Twain

“These descriptions do really state the truth- as nearly as the limitations of language will allow. But language is a treacherous thing,…

— Mark Twain

It is not like studying German, where you mull along, in a groping, uncertain way, for thirty years; and at last, just…

— Mark Twain

My philological studies have satisfied me that a gifted person ought to learn English (barring spelling and pronouncing) in thirty hours, French…

— Mark Twain

So avoid using the word 'very' because it's lazy. A man is not very tired, he is exhausted. Don't use very sad,…

— Mark Twain

Now when I had mastered the language of this water, and had come to know every trifling feature that bordered the great…

— Mark Twain

The face of the water, in time, became a wonderful book- a book that was a dead language to the uneducated passenger,…

— Mark Twain

To get the right word in the right place is a rare achievement.

— Mark Twain

Kindness is a Language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see.

— Mark Twain

Use the right word, not its second cousin.

— Mark Twain

Kindness is a language which the deaf can hear and the and the blind can see

— Mark Twain

How charmed I am when I overhear a German word which I understand!

— Mark Twain

Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often.

— Mark Twain

Words are only painted fire; a look is the fire itself.

— Mark Twain