English Language Private

Famous quotes containing the words english, language and/or private:

“The boneless quality of English conversation, which, so far as I have heard it, is all form and no content. Listening to Britons dining out is like watching people play first-class tennis with imaginary balls.”
—Margaret Halsey (b. 1910)

“Syntax and vocabulary are overwhelming constraints—the rules that run us. Language is using us to talk—we think we’re using the language, but language is doing the thinking, we’re its slavish agents.”
—Harry Mathews (b. 1930)

“The highest panegyric, therefore, that private virtue can receive, is the praise of servants.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)