David Crystal Quotes

A dictionary is a reference book that lists the words of one or more languages, usually in alphabetical order, along with information about their spelling, pronunciation, grammatical status, meaning, history, and use.

David Crystal

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Quotes to Explore

• The modern tradition is the tradition of revolt. The French Revolution is still our model today: history is violent change, and this change goes by the name of progress. I do not know whether these notions really apply to art.

  

  Octavio Paz
  • Art
  • History
  • Today

• The books that help you most are those which make you think that most. The hardest way of learning is that of easy reading; but a great book that comes from a great thinker is a ship of thought, deep freighted with truth and beauty.

  

  Pablo Neruda
  • Great
  • Book
  • Truth

• The state must be the first to be organized and totally committed to serving the interests of the people.

  

  Samora Machel
  • People
  • First
  • Serving

• For me, the whole process involves envisioning this book in my head as I'm working.

  

  Daniel Clowes
  • Book
  • Working
  • Process

• When you're writing a book, you don't really think about it critically. You don't want to know too well what you're doing. First, you write the book, then you find the justification for it.

  

  E. L. Doctorow
  • Writing
  • Book
  • Doing

• I think one's history and past is important at a certain time in your life, especially as an artist, just to try to hone in on that.

  

  Olivia d'Abo
  • Life
  • Time
  • Important

• I might see something on TV and get inspired to write about it. I can't sit down and plan to write. It has to come to me in my head like someone telling me the words.

  

  Aaron Neville
  • Words
  • Me
  • Inspired

• I know from an editor's point of view or a publisher's point of view it's easier to slot me into a particular niche. But I know that I'd be bored unless I wrote a book that in some senses was a challenge.

  

  Vikram Seth
  • Book
  • Me
  • Challenge

• It's easier to release an ebook than a print book.

  

  J. A. Konrath
  • Book
  • Easier
  • Print

• Having a lot of people suddenly depending on me to get the job done was a marvelous motivator. The book and movie deals seemed to flip a switch in my head, and off I went.

  

  Laura Hillenbrand
  • People
  • Done
  • Job

• I should have died in ambushes a hundred times.

  

  Sam Childers
  • Should
  • Times
  • Hundred

• History is a set of lies agreed upon.

  

  Napoleon Bonaparte
  • History
  • Lies
  • Agreed

• My favorite book in life is 'A Wrinkle In Time,' which I read before high school. It was my first introduction into the meeting of science and spirit and the universe and big thoughts and all of those interesting New Age-y concepts. It made everything make sense to me and opened up my mind.

  

  Mae Whitman
  • Life
  • Up
  • Time

• Book sales and teens reading is always a fantastic thing, but we should also be celebrating and consuming the huge wealth of U.K. and U.K.-based writing and illustrating talent. Authors such as Charlie Higson, Darren Shan, Holly Smale, Tanya Byrne, Catherine Johnson, Sophie Mckenzie, to name but a few.

  

  Malorie Blackman
  • Writing
  • Book
  • Reading

• A subject which at first glance seems quite removed from the undeclared concern of the book can encapsulate that concern.

  

  W. G. Sebald
  • Book
  • First
  • Concern

• The daily quota I've set for myself is 500 words or approximately a page and a half double-spaced. Which isn't much, except that I'm extremely slow, extremely meticulous. 'Le mot juste' haunts me. On a good day, I will finally secrete the 500th word at about 5 o'clock, and I'll reward myself by going to Housing Works Bookstore to read.

  

  Said Sayrafiezadeh
  • Good
  • Words
  • Day

• Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and in actions.

  

  Harold S. Geneen
  • Words
  • Attitude
  • Leadership

• Time dissolves in summer anyway: days are long, weekends longer. Hours get all thin and watery when you are lost in the book you'd never otherwise have time to read. Senses are sharper - something about the moist air and bright light and fruit in season - and so memories stir and startle.

  

  Nancy Gibbs
  • Time
  • Long
  • Book

• Oh, I love making independent films, it's such a special, magical thing because you collaborate with a small group of people and everyone's pitching in. You'll see producers setting up the lunch table and the sound guy driving a van. We're all really there because we want to be.

  

  Olivia Thirlby
  • People
  • Lunch
  • Magical

• We cannot overstate our debt to the Past, but the moment has the supreme claim. The Past is for us; but the sole terms on which it can become ours are its subordination to the Present. Only an inventor knows how to borrow, and every man is or should be an inventor. We must not tamper with the organic motion of the soul.

  

  Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • Soul
  • Past
  • Present

• The key here is that we're not going to beat them on commercials: They're always going to have more money than us. So what we have to try to do throughout is just ask people to make sure they vote.

  

  Joe Garcia
  • People
  • Money

• Media coverage both shapes and reflects public opinion. The press coverage in the run-up to the war was very pro-war and the country was very pro-war.

  

  Andrew Kohut
  • Country
  • War
  • Opinion

• A dictionary is a reference book that lists the words of one or more languages, usually in alphabetical order, along with information about their spelling, pronunciation, grammatical status, meaning, history, and use.

  

  David Crystal
  • Book
  • History
  • Words