Category Archives: Quotes

As every second post on this site is a quote. You’ll find a deep and broad variety of quotes under this category, which overlap with several other tags and categories. Many of the quotes are larded with links for deeper reading on the subject of the quote, or connections between the subject of the quotes and other people, things, or ideas. See the Taxonomies page for more about this category.

Gabriela Mistral

Posted on September 16, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Gabriela Mistral originally Luclila Godoy Alcayaga: (1889-1957) Chilean poet. Mistral combined writing with a career as a cultural minister and diplomat, and as a professor in the U.S. Her reputation as a poet was established in 1914 when she won a prize for “Sonetos de la Muerte” (“Sonnets of Death”). Her passionate lyrics, with love of children and of the downtrodden as principal themes, are collected in such volumes as Desolacion (1922), Tala (1938), and Lagar (1954. In 1945 she became the first Latin American woman to win the Nobel Prize.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

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Bogota

Posted on September 10, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Bogota: city, capital of Colombia. The District Capital area is officially known as Santafe de Bogota. It lies on a plateau east of the Andes, European settlement began in 1538 when Spanish conquistadores overran Bacata, the main seat of the Chibcha Indians; the name was soon corrupted to Bogota, It became the capital of the viceroyalty of New Granada and a center of Spanish colonial power in South America. It was the scene of a revolt against Spanish rule in 1810-11, and Simon Bolivar took the city in 1819. It became the capital of the confederation of Gran Colombia; when that was dissolved in 1830, it remained the capital of New Granada (later, Republic of Colombia). Today Bogota is an industrial, educational, and cultural center.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

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Tomas Carrasquilla

Posted on September 10, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Tomas Carrasquilla: (1858-1940) Colombian novelist and writer of short stories, novellas, and cuadros de costumbres. Born in the Andean department of Antioquia, Carrasquilla is first and foremost the painter of Colombian provincial life. His masterpiece is La Marquesa de Yolombo (1926), Set in the late 18th century, it is the story of the energetic dona Barbara Caballero, whose adventures and misadventures are symbolic of the conflicts between colonial Nueva Grande and imperial Spain. Other works include Frutos de me tierra (1896), a realistic novel, and Hace tiempo (193637), as well as numerous short stories and folk tales.”

Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.

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Bernardo O’Higgins

Posted on September 10, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Bernardo O’Higgins: (1776?-1842) South American revolutionary leader and first Chilean head of state (1817-23). The illegitimate son of a Spanish officer of Irish origin, he was educated in Peru, Spain, and England, where his Chilean nationalism was awakened. When Napoleon invaded Spain (1808) and Spanish control of Chile relaxed, he became a member of Chile’s new congress. He led the defensive forces when Chile was invaded by royalists from Peru in 1814; defeated, he fled to Argentina, He returned in 1817 with Jose de San Martin and defeated the Spanish. Elected supreme director of Chile, he established a working governmental organization, but his reforms antagonized conservatives and he resigned.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

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William Hazlitt on Hypocrites

Posted on September 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

“We are not hypocrites in our sleep.”

William Hazlitt

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

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Rotten Reviews: A John O’Hara Omnibus

Posted on September 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

Sermons and Soda-Water

“The novellas represent no change in Mr. O’Hara’s method. He normally puts everything into a novel, including the kitchen sink complete with stopped drain, plumber, and plumber’s mate, and does this not once, but four or five times per book. The novella form has merely limited the author in a statistical way; one kitchen sink is all he can fit into his predetermined space…

Atlantic Monthly

 The Big Laugh

When O’Hara is good he is very, very good; when he is bad he is writing for Hollywood…an exercise in tedium.”

New York Herald Tribune

The Horse Knows the Way

“One might suggest…that the inhabitants of hell be condemned to an eternity reading stories behind the headlines in American tabloids….John O’Hara’s new collection of short stories brings the whole realm uncomfortably close. It is a punishment to read….”

Excerpted from: Barnard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.   

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Vowel

Posted on September 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

“vowel: Speech sound in which air from the lungs passes through the mouth with minimal obstruction and without audible friction like the f in fit. The word also refers to a letter representing such a sound (a, e, i, o, u, and sometimes y). In articulatory phonetics (see articulation), vowels are classified by tongue and lip position; for example, high vowels like the i in machine and the u in flute are both pronounced with the tongue arched high in the mouth, but in u the lips are also rounded. Single vowel sounds are monophthongs; two vowel sounds pronounced as one syllable, like the ou in round, are diphthongs.”

Excerpted/Adapted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

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Mezzotint

Posted on August 29, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Mezzotint: A process of intaglio engraving commonly practiced in the 18th century to reproduce the tonal effects of painting. A metal plate, usually copper or steel, is roughened with a rocking tool which makes indentations and raises a burr. The burr is scraped away where lighter tones in the design are desired.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

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The Doubter’s Companion: Propaganda

Posted on August 29, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Propaganda: The means by which the thousands of organizations in a corporatist society communicate with each other and with the general public.

From its origins in the Vatican Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (Congregati de propaganda fide), a body devoted to spreading the Christian doctrine in foreign lands, the idea of substituting propagation for explanation was seized upon by the heroic national leaders of the late eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries. Propaganda married romanticism with facts, which seemed to replace any need for understanding. With the invention of marketing tools such as the press release, advertisements, sound bites, PR firms and press officers, this rather exclusive way of influencing people was quickly available to anyone with a budget.

Where once a government minister had a press officer, now every section in a ministry has one. Private corporations have whole communications departments. The American army alone has a corps of some 5,000 press officers.

The purpose of these several hundred thousand communications experts is to prevent communication or any generalized grasp of reality. Their job is to propagate the faith.”

Excerpted from: Saul, John Ralston. The Doubter’s Companion. New York: The Free Press, 1994.

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Colloquial

Posted on August 29, 2023 | Leave a comment

“Colloquial (adjective): Describing words or expressions common to language as it is spoken or to writing intended to be naturally conversational in effect; informal, rather than elevated; involving or characteristic of conversation. Adverb: colloquially; Noun: colloquiality, colloquialness, colloquialist; Verb: colloquialize.”

Excerpted from: Grambs, David. The Random House Dictionary for Writers and Readers. New York: Random House, 1990.

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