quotations about words
As the bud a leaf, so at last the thought becomes a word.
RICHARD GARNETT
De Flagello Myrtes
Of what use are good words to an evil heart?
LOUIS BECKE
"Solepa", By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore and Other Stories
Words are powerful, especially when they become actions.
PETE WILSON
"Words are powerful, especially when they become actions", Brazil Times, March 5, 2017
What so wild as words are?
ROBERT BROWNING
A Woman's Last Word
Words [are] more beautiful than a found fall leaf.
WILLIAM H. GASS
A Temple of Texts
Words are only painted fire; a look is the fire itself.
MARK TWAIN
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Words are but the shining garments of Thought.
EDWIN LEIBFREED
"The Song of the Soul"
Words can only hurt you if you try to read them. Don't play their game!
BEN STILLER
Zoolander
First words are critical. Just ask any novelist or screenplay writer.
RICK BROWN
"The first words you need to hear", Your Houston News, January 13, 2016
I am not for imposing any sense on your words: you are at liberty to explain them as you please. Only, I beseech you, make me understand something by them.
GEORGE BERKELEY
Three Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonous
All knowledge which ends in words will die as quickly as it came to life.
LEONARDO DA VINCI
Thoughts on Art and Life
I suppose that people, using themselves and each other so much by words, are at least consistent in attributing wisdom to a still tongue.
WILLIAM FAULKNER
The Sound and the Fury
I was struck by the way in which meanings are historically attached to words: it is so accidental, so remote, so twisted. A word is like a schoolgirl's room--a complete mess--so the great thing is to make out a way of seeing it all as ordered, as right, as inferred and following.
WILLIAM H. GASS
The Paris Review, summer 1977
If we use common words on a great occasion, they are the more striking, because they are felt at once to have a particular meaning, like old banners, or everyday clothes, hung up in a sacred place.
GEORGE ELIOT
The Mill on the Floss
I am increasingly afflicted by vertigo where words mean nothing.
DORIS LESSING
The Golden Notebook
No one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.
HENRY ADAMS
The Education of Henry Adams
Desires and words go hand in hand ... they are moved by the same intention to join together, to communicate, to establish bridges between people, whether they are spoken or written.
LAURA ESQUIVEL
Swift as Desire
I sit and say nothing for fear
My words will turn to stone
And though they are sincere,
They will become a prison of their own.
GARRISON KEILLOR
Pilgrims
It's tremendously hard work. Yes, I love arranging the words and having them fall on the ear the right way and you know you're not quite there and you're redoing it and redoing it and there's a wonderful thrill to it. But it is hard.
ELIZABETH STROUT
Newsweek, July 13, 2009
The words of God are deeds.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims