Words on Words: Quotations about Language and LanguagesFrom Homer ("winged words") to Robert Burns ("Beware a tongue that's smoothly hung") to Rudyard Kipling ("Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind"), writers from all over the world have put pen to paper on the inexhaustible topic of language. Yet surprisingly, their writings on the subject have never been gathered in a single volume. In Words on Words, David and Hilary Crystal have collected nearly 5,000 quotations about language and all its intriguing aspects: speaking, reading, writing, translation, verbosity, usage, slang, and more. As the stock-in-trade of so many professions—orators, media personalities, writers, and countless others—language's appeal as a subject is extraordinarily relevant and wide-ranging. The quotations are grouped thematically under 65 different headings, from "The Nature of Language" through the "Language of Politics" to "Quoting and Misquoting." This arrangement enables the reader to explore a topic through a variety of lenses, ancient and modern, domestic and foreign, scientific and casual, ironic and playful. Three thorough indexes—to authors, sources, and key words—provide different entry points into the collection. A valuable resource for professional writers and scholars, Words on Words is for anyone who loves language and all things linguistic. |
Contents
Language in Thinking and Thought | 9 |
Body Language | 23 |
Everchanging Language | 36 |
The Language of Youth and Age | 50 |
Bilingualism and Multilingualism | 66 |
Translating and Interpreting | 70 |
Exposing Language | 87 |
Listening | 100 |
Words Words Words | 187 |
Words as Weapons | 202 |
Wornout Words | 215 |
The Secret of Style | 231 |
Metaphors and Similes | 246 |
Accents and Dialects | 248 |
The Language of Politics | 263 |
The Performing Arts | 278 |
Learning to Read and Write | 113 |
The Nature of Eloquence | 131 |
Subjectmatter | 147 |
Saying Just Enough | 160 |
Friendly Language | 168 |
Postscript | 292 |
317 | |
Index of Key Words Phrases and Concepts | 336 |
Other editions - View all
Words on Words: Quotations about Language and Languages David Crystal,Hilary Crystal Limited preview - 2000 |
Words on Words: Quotations about Language and Languages David Crystal,Hilary Crystal No preview available - 2000 |
Common terms and phrases
4th century BC Ambrose Bierce American Bleak House Book Canto Charles Dickens Complete Essays trans conversation Devil's Dictionary Dictionary entry added discourse E. J. Hopkins ears Ecclesiasticus eloquence English Language expression French Gentleman George Bernard Shaw guage hear Henry human James Boswell Jerusalem Bible John Dryden Jonathan Swift Lady Latin Laurence Sterne learned letter linguistic living Lord Byron M. A. Screech matter mean metaphor Michel de Montaigne mind nature never Oliver Wendell Holmes Opinions of Tristram Oscar Wilde phrase Poems poet poetry Preface prose Proverbial Chinese Proverbial German quotations quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson rhyme Robert Samuel Butler Samuel Johnson Samuel Taylor Coleridge Sect sense sentences silence slang sound speak speech spoken style T. S. Eliot talk thing Thomas thou thought translation truth understand verbs voice W. H. Auden William Hazlitt William Shakespeare William Wordsworth words write