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Words Quotes

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Words Quotes

“You've never seen that? Tiny little pieces of pasta in the shape of letters of the alphabet. The letters are mixed together, they float in the broth as if it were a three-dimensional book. When you eat them, you feel like you're gobbling words, sentences, entire conversations, entire chapters of novels. Kids love it. It's like the opposite of speaking: rather than syllables coming out of your mouth, letters go in your mouth and are swallowed.”

“Peculiar to Sydney, in those days, was a single word written in chalk in beautiful, looping copperplate on street corners. Sydney was known for it, the word chalked at the feet of the inhabitants and visitors, like a letter consisting of a lone word, but personally addressed to each member of a crowd. . . . It says ‘Eternity,’ love. . . . A man has been writing that word in chalk for thirty years. It’s famous now.”

“A poetess is not as selfish as you assume. After months of agonising over her marriage of words—the bride— and spaces—the groom, she knows that as soon as she has penned the poem, it’s yours to consume. So, without giving it a think, she blows on the ink and the letters fly away like dandelions on a windy day, landing on hands and lips, on hearts and hips. But more often than not, you can easily spot them trodden and forgotten, becoming sodden and rotten. Yet, she will continue to make what’s others to take because selfishness is not the mark of a poetess.”

“They say instant communication is not communication at all but merely a frantic, trivial, nerve-wracking bombardment of clichés, threats, fads, fashions, gibberish and advertising. However, who has not hung on a scripture, a quote, a statement, only to stumble upon the key phrase that brought all things to a turning point? The greatest sermons and speeches were pieced together by illuminating thoughts that powered men to surpass their own commonness. It is the sparkling magic of letters forming words, and those words colliding with passion, that makes statements into wisdom.”

“A man with a scant vocabulary will almost certainly be a weak thinker. The richer and more copious one's vocabulary and the greater one's awareness of fine distinctions and subtle nuances of meaning, the more fertile and precise is likely to be one's thinking. Knowledge of things and knowledge of the words for them grow together. If you do not know the words, you can hardly know the thing.”

“Your words have power. [...] "How are you?" "Ah - can't complain," or "No use complaining," or "Not too bad." How does the brain respond to these dreary views? Is it a "pain in the neck" to do the dishes? Is it "one big headache" to balance your checkbook? Are you "sick and tired" of the weather we are having? I am convinced that [doctors] owe a large part of their income to the words we use. Remember, the brain is no subtle interpreter. It says, "This guy's asking for a headache. Okay. One headache coming up." Of course, every time that we say something gives us a pain, a pain does not immediately result. The body's natural state is good health, and all its processes are geared toward health. In time, though, with enough verbal pounding away at its defenses, it delivers up the very illnesses we order.”

“For her the magic was not what words had been, but what they were capable of: their ability to sketch, with one sweeping brushstroke, the contours of an experience, the form of a feeling. How they could make the effable effable, how they could never be fully unraveled, it held infinite mysteries and wonders and sometimes all you could do was stand agape, rubbing your eyes, trying to see properly.”

“Words can evoke emotions, change minds, teach lessons, convey ideas, lift spirits, or simply make us smile. I am here to tell you that as a young boy, when I read the great authors, the words sang and danced for me; the words caused me to dream; the words caused me to laugh and smile; The words gave me hope; The words brought me to tears. Young and unaware, I wondered how this is possible-how can words on a page in a book have such a profound effect on me? So many years later, I believe I finally know the answer to that question: Words are the foundation of our humanity. We exist in our words. We are the words that we choose. Words matter. It’s as simple as that.”