Literature and Words

Day by day the old order of things changes, and new modes of thought pass over our world, and it may be that, before many years, talking will have taken the place of literature, and the personal screech silenced the music of impersonal utterance. Something of the dignity of the literary calling will probably be lost, and it is perhaps a dangerous thing for a country to be too eloquent.

In the dying world I come from quotation is a national vice. No one would think of makingan after-dinner speech without the help ofpoetry. It used to be the classics, now it’s lyric verse.

Toutes les histoires anciennes, comme le disait un de nos beaux esprits, ne sont que des fables convenues .

Arma virumque cano .

As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent too. Words are used to disguise, notto illuminate, action: You liberate a city by destroying it. Words are used to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.

Prends l’éloquence et tords-lui le cou .

Et tout le reste est littérature .

Un poème n’est jamais achevé—c’est toujours un accident qui le termine .

[ On the Bible :] It is full of interest. It hasnoble poetry in it; and some clever fables; and some blood-drenched history; and some good morals; and a wealth of obscenity; and upwards of a thousand lies.

News is history in its first and best form, its vivid and fascinating form . . . history is the pale and tranquil reflection of it.

The language [German] which enables aman to travel all day in one sentence withoutchanging cars.

What are the proper proportions of a maxim? A minimum of sound to a maximum of sense.

“Classic.” A book which people praise and don’t read.

The difference between the almost -right word& the right word is really a large matter—it’sthe difference between the lightning-bug & thelightning.

You don’t know about me, without you haveread a book by the name of “The Adventuresof Tom Sawyer,” but that ain’t no matter. Thatbook was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he toldthe truth, mainly.

Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; personsattempting to find a moral in it will bebanished; persons attempting to find a plot in itwill be shot.

The drawing shows me at a glance what would be spread over ten pages in a book.

The Literary “Fellow Travelers” of the Revolution.

Gonzo journalism . . . is a style of “reporting” based on William Faulkner’s idea that the best fiction is far more true than any kind of journalism—and the best journalists have always known this.

I have thus played the sedulous ape to Hazlitt, to Lamb, to Wordsworth, to Sir ThomasBrowne, to Defoe, to Hawthorne, to Montaigne, to Baudelaire, and to Obermann.

There is but one art—to omit! O if I knew how to omit, I would ask no other knowledge.

I know of only one rule: style cannot be too clear , too simple .

Un roman est un miroir qui se promène sur une grande route .

I have not wasted my life trifling with literary fools in taverns as [Samuel] Johnson did when he should have been shaking England with the thunder of his spirit.