“Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.”
Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes (comic strip), 8 Nov. 1989
Excerpted from: Shapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference
Tagged art/architecture/design, humor
“President n. The leading figure in a small group of men of whom—and of whom only—it is positively known that immense numbers of their countrymen did not want any of them for President.”
Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. David E. Schultz and S.J. Joshi, eds. The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2000.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged humor, literary oddities
“An approach to teaching developed by philosopher Mortimer Adler that combines coaching, lecturing, and Socratic dialogue as teaching methods to encourage deep thinking about such traditional subjects as literature, mathematics, science, and the performing arts. Adler’s Paideia Proposal, and Paideia Problems and Possibilities are rooted in the social, political, and educational philosophy of Aristotle.”
Excerpted from: Ravitch, Diane. EdSpeak: A Glossary of Education Terms, Phrases, Buzzwords, and Jargon. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 2007.
“I work for a Government I despise for ends I think criminal.”
Letter to Duncan Grant, 15 December 1917
Excerpted from: Shapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Id * Ego * Superego
“Sigmund Freud conceived of the personality as consisting of three interrelated influences. The Id is a person’s natural instincts and desires, such as to procreate, to eat and to survive. The Ego uses reason to mediate between reality and the Id, so one might say that in today’s world I can only afford two children, or there are six people needing to eat so I can’t have the whole chicken. Lastly, there is the Superego, akin to the conscience, and thought to originate as an internal version of what parents, school, and society teach. This introduces the concept of ‘I should’–for example, share my good fortune with those less fortunate than myself.”
Excerpted from: Rogerson, Barnaby. Rogerson’s Book of Numbers: The Culture of Numbers–from 1,001 Nights to the Seven Wonders of the World. New York: Picador, 2013.
“Ross once stated emphatically to Robert Benchley: ‘Don’t think I’m not incoherent.'”
Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.
Posted in English Language Arts, New York City, Quotes, Reference
Tagged diction/grammar/style/usage, humor, literary oddities
“The book is long, drawn out, full of repetitions, and marred throughout by its obscenity and irreligion.”
Catholic World
Excerpted from: Bernard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged fiction/literature, literary oddities
“Primarily understood as works produced by artists who lack formal training, although trained artists may deliberately affect a naive style. The term most clearly describes such early-20th-century artists as the Douanier Rousseau, whose childlike, non-naturalistic paintings completed in bright colors influenced early modern artists. Their apparent affinity with non-Western art and their bold expressiveness made them appealing to the early Modernists searching for new forms of expression.
See ‘Outsider’ art.”
Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged art/architecture/design
“A narrative such as a story, song, verse, or ballad handed down from the past and often conveying the lore of a culture. It is distinguished from myth by its closer relation to historical fact than to the supernatural. The earliest legends recounted the lives of saints. The term also applies to the brief explanations of symbols used in pictures, maps, and charts.”
Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged fiction/literature, poetry
“[Catchphrase of dummy ‘Charlie McCarthy‘:]
Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance?”
Quoted in Robert Byrne, The Other 637 Best Thing Anybody Ever Said (1984)
Excerpted from: Shapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.
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