Words

"The limits of my language are the limits of my mind. All I know is what I have words for." -Ludwig Wittgenstein
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Old Fashioned

"...in an abundant society where people have laptops, cell phones, iPods, and minds like empty rooms, I still plod along with books. Instant information is not for me. I prefer to search library stacks because when I work to learn something, I remember it." -Harper Lee
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But I Do Like Coffee

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Buh Bye

"Can you unfriend someone on Facebook without them knowing it?" -the editor of a certain magazine. Clearly, being up-to-date on social media was not a requirement for his job (unfortunately).
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Better Keep Drinking

"By drinking a cup more coffee than usual, people in a Tufts University study increased their ability to spot grammatical errors." -March issue of Family Circle magazine
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Swedish Newspapers

Where was this when I wrote my thesis?!
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Pure

"A recurring ideal, I find, is that of simplicity  At times there comes the desire to write with great precision and clarity, words so simple and moving that they bring tears to the eyes." -R.S. Thomas
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Not Exactly Promising...

"The best work in literature is always done by those who do not depend on it for their daily bread and the highest form of literature, Poetry, brings no wealth to the singer ... Make some sacrifice for your art and you will be repair but ask of art to sacrifice herself for you and a bitter disappointment may come to you." -a recently discovered letter from Oscar Wilde to an aspiring writer.
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. , : ; !

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Vocation

"Sometimes nothing is so solid to me as writing -- I suppose that's what a vocation means -- at times a torment, a bad conscience, but all in all, purpose and direction." -Robert Lowell
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Dependent

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Beyond Self

"My own life isn't terribly interesting, even to myself, and that... [is] why I write about people and places so different from the ones I know." -Stewart O'Nan
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Nuts

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The Few

"I've always written for a small audience consisting of people like myself, who are well-educated, worldly, skeptical and snobbish (meaning that they rank good taste over bad). And who believe that nothing and nobody is special." -author Simon Raven
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Public Speaking

"My main reason for turning into an essayist [...was] the painful fact that I stuttered so badly that writing essays was my best chance to talk." -Edward Hoagland
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Writing

"I can't persuade myself that writing is honest work. It's great fun and I love it. For one thing, it's the only way I can get to sit down." -Shirley Jackson
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One Word, Not Two

"Froufrou: Fussy or showy dress or ornamentations." -latest update to the AP Stylebook.
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Bare

"I think that whenever we give our pen some free will, we may surprise ourselves. All that wanting to seem normal in regular life, all that fitting in falls away in the face of one's own strange self on that page." -Sharon Olds
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Stuck

"I wanted to write so much that I couldn't write a word." -Walker Evans
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On the Calendar

"I like deadlines. I need deadlines. I'm not a compulsive writer -- I don't write every day. I've learned not to go to the computer until I know what I want to write." -playwright Terrence McNally


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