Richard Lederer
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Carnivores eat flesh and meat; piscivores eat fish; herbivores eat plants and vegetables; verbivores devour words. I am such a creature.
—Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore
Posted on March 18, 1999 at 11:50 PM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
It is indeed acceptable practice to sometimes split an infinitive. If infinitive-splitting makes available just the shade of meaning you desire or if avoiding the separation creates a confusing ambiguity or patent artificiality, you are entitled to happily go ahead and split!
—Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore, 1994
Posted on July 20, 2002 at 7:56 AM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Words are ideas fraught with particular recognitions and energies that enlarge and quicken life. Blur shades of meaning in language and you blur shades of thinking.
—Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore
Posted on May 8, 2002 at 7:56 PM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
[C]hange in language need not be equated with corruption or decay. English is alive and well and living in our voices, pens, and word processors, and that means all of us, not just the language experts. If vox populi decrees that unique means "unusual" as well as "unequaled," we should listen to that vox with the utmost respect.
—Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore
Posted on December 12, 2001 at 9:15 AM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Language reflects the fearful asymmetry of the human race, and you can't get that kind of logic. In a perfectly logical language, if "pro" and "con" are opposites, then is "congress" the opposite of "progress"? I mean we have a language in which "What's going on?" and "What's coming off?" mean the same thing, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites, a language in which the third hand on a clock or watch is called the second hand, and your nose can run and your feet smell. I'm not looking for logic in language because human beings, not computers, make language, and we're not logical.
—Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore
Posted on January 9, 2002 at 9:20 AM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
Over the years I've discovered that a love of language does not necessarily have anything to do with one's profession or occupation. Avid word buffs come from every field. They're lawyers, doctors, teachers, retired people, secretaries, nurses, insurance brokers, salespeople, housewives, and househusbands. I know a bridge builder, a real "dese" and "dose" kind of fellow, who loves language as passionately as any of us.
—Richard Lederer, Gloria Rosenthal, quoted in Adventures of a Verbivore
Posted on November 21, 2001 at 9:09 AM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
To a man or woman who knows its origin, each word presents a picture, no matter how ordinary it may appear. Sometimes the attrition wrought by time and human memory has ravaged the images so that no trace is left. In other instances, surface grime can be wiped away so that the beauty of the details can be restored and the contours and colors can once again be seen.
—Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore
Posted on November 28, 2001 at 8:04 AM
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