Precise

Famous quotes containing the word precise:

    In contrast to the flux and muddle of life, art is clarity and enduring presence. In the stream of life, few things are perceived clearly because few things stay put. Every mood or emotion is mixed or diluted by contrary and extraneous elements. The clarity of art—the precise evocation of mood in the novel, or of summer twilight in a painting—is like waking to a bright landscape after a long fitful slumber, or the fragrance of chicken soup after a week of head cold.
    Yi-Fu Tuan (b. 1930)

    Writing prejudicial, off-putting reviews is a precise exercise in applied black magic. The reviewer can draw free- floating disagreeable associations to a book by implying that the book is completely unimportant without saying exactly why, and carefully avoiding any clear images that could capture the reader’s full attention.
    William Burroughs (b. 1914)

    The opera isn’t over till the fat lady sings.
    —Anonymous.

    A modern proverb along the lines of “don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched.” This form of words has no precise origin, though both Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations (16th ed., 1992)