Information can tell us everything. It has all the answers. But they are answers to questions we have not asked, and which doubtless don’t even arise.
—Jean Baudrillard, c. 1987Quotes
The only authors whom I acknowledge as American are the journalists. They indeed are not great writers, but they speak the language of their countrymen, and make themselves heard by them.
—Alexis de Tocqueville, 1840Words pay no debts.
—William Shakespeare, 1601I sometimes think of what future historians will say of us. A single sentence will suffice for modern man: he fornicated and read the papers.
—Albert Camus, 1957No one gossips about other people’s secret virtues.
—Bertrand Russell, 1961A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself.
—Arthur Miller, 1961Writing cannot express words fully; words cannot express thoughts fully.
—The Book of Changes, c. 350 BCI am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.
—Samuel Johnson, 1773Do not the most moving moments of our lives find us all without words?
—Marcel Marceau, 1958It is impossible to translate the poets. Can you translate music?
—Voltaire, c. 1732Slang is as old as speech and the congregating together of people in cities. It is the result of crowding and excitement and artificial life.
—John Camden Hotten, 1859How absurd men are! They never use the liberties they have, they demand those they do not have. They have freedom of thought, they demand freedom of speech.
—Søren Kierkegaard, 1843Under all speech that is good for anything, there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep as eternity; speech is shallow as time.
—Thomas Carlyle, 1838