SOME USEFUL DEFINITIONS
Civilization is the distance man has placed between himself and his excreta.
Brian AldissArt is something that makes you proud to be human.
Amiri BarakaHumour is falling downstairs if you do it while in the act of warning your wife not to.
Kenneth BirdThe miracle is not that we have done so much with our world, but that we ever did anything.
Ray BradburyLife is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.
Charlie ChaplinDemocracy is the worst form of government, except all the others that have been tried.
Sir Winston ChurchillTact consists in knowing how far to go in going too far.
Jean CocteauYouth is a period of missed opportunities
Cyril ConnollyLiterature is the art of writing something that will be read twice.
Cyril ConnollyDeath is what makes life an event.
Francis Ford CoppolaArguing with a woman is like trying to read a newspaper in the wind.
Fjodor DostojevskiReality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.
Albert EinsteinComedy. like sodomy, is an unnatural act.
Marty FeldmanBeer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.
Benjamin FranklinMotivation is when your dreams put on work clothes.
Benjamin FranklinLove is an irresistable desire to be irresistably desired.
Robert FrostOnly those things are beautiful which are inspired by madness and written by reason.
André GideFilm is truth, 24 times a second
Jean-Luc GodardProse is architecture, not interior decoration.
Ernest HemingwayMost of one's life is one prolonged effort to prevent oneself thinking.
Aldous HuxleyA tired exclamation mark is a question mark.
Stanislaw Jerzy LecInk is the great cure for all human ills.
C.S. LewisGod is a concept by which we measure our pain.
John LennonLife is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans.
John LennonA writer is a person for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.
Thomas MannMen are creatures who have two legs and eight arms.
Jayne MansfieldComedy is the very last alternative to despair. The greater the menace the more potent and important the function of comedy.
Frank MarcusA satirist is a man who discovers unpleasant things about himself and then says them about other people.
Peter McArthurLanguage is a form of organized stutter.
Marshall McLuhanLove is the imagination's victory over intelligence.
H. L. MenckenIt is a sin to believe bad things about someone else, althougn seldom a mistake.
H. L. MenckenPuritanism – the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
H.L. MenckenAn author is a fool who, not content with boring those he lives with, insists on boring future generations.
Charles de MontesquieuSex is good for slimming.
Julie NewmarLove is a disease you cannot hide. One word, one look, even a silence betrays it.
Ahbélard PierreCritic is a legless man who teaces other people to run
Channing PollockLiterature is news that stays news.
Ezra PoundGreat literature is simply language charged with meaning to the utmost possible degree.
Ezra PoundComplaints of suffering are the origins of language.
Raymond QueneauCivilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage's whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men.
Ayn RandWords are a lens to focus one's mind.
Ayn RandHumility is the worst form of conceit.
François Duc de La RochefoucauldHumour is the ability to see three sides of one coin.
Ned RoremSlang is the language that rolls up its sleeves, spits on its hands and goes to work.
Carl SandburgLiterature is the immortality of speech.
August Wilhelm von SchlegelWords are tools which automatically carve concepts out of experience.
Julian Sorrell HuxleyLanguage is the main instrument of man's refusal to accept the world as it is.
George SteinerChange is not merely necessary to life, it is life.
Alvin TofflerMan is the only animal that blushes. Or needs to.
Mark TwainA critic is a man who knows the way but can't drive the car.
Kenneth TynanLaughter or crying is what a human being does when there's nothing else he can do.
Kurt VonnegutHistory is merely a list of surprises. It can only prepare us to be surprised yet again.
Kurt VonnegutWe are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.
Kurt VonnegutAdvertising is legalized lying.
H. G. WellsMoral indignation is jealousy with a halo.
H.G. WellsThe truly brave man is not the man who does not feel fear but the man who overcomes it.
H.G. WellsA pessimist is one who, when he has a choice of two evils, chooses both.
Oscar WildeThe present is the ever moving shadow that divides yesterday from tomorrow.
Frank Lloyd WrightDancing is a vertical manifestation of a horizontal desire.
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