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61 " Lord, deliver us from what we already knew we wanted. Give us some new desires, the weirder the better. "
― Mark Forsyth , The Unknown Unknown: Bookshops and the Delight of Not Getting What You Wanted
62 " Human beings, for some reason or another, like symmetry. You leave a bunch of them next to a jungle for a couple of days and you'll come back to find an ornamental garden. We take stones and turn them into the Taj Mahal or St. Paul's Cathedral. "
― Mark Forsyth , The Elements of Eloquence: How to Turn the Perfect English Phrase
63 " Who needs sense when you have alliteration? "
64 " The medievals often mixed up their Gs and Ws, which is why another word for guarantee is warranty. "
― Mark Forsyth , The Etymologicon: A Circular Stroll through the Hidden Connections of the English Language
65 " This leads to the great theory of human history: that we didn’t start farming because we wanted food—there was loads of that around. We started farming because we wanted booze. "
― Mark Forsyth , A Short History of Drunkenness
66 " Wouldst like to con a glimmer with me this early black?’, which he [Cab Calloway] helpfully explains as ‘the proper way to ask a young lady to go to the movies’. It should be noted here, that if the object of your affections replies ‘Kill me’, they are not requesting to be euthanatised and you should not actually murder them. Kill me is merely the Cab Calloway way of saying ‘Show me a good time’ and is the best response you could have hoped for. Jive was rather confusing in this way. "
― Mark Forsyth , The Horologicon: A Day's Jaunt Through the Lost Words of the English Language
67 " For though one antithesis is grand, a long list of antitheses is divine and is technically known as a progressio. It was a favorite of God and Dickens "
68 " adjectives in English absolutely have to be in this order: opinion-size-age-shape-colour-origin-material-purpose Noun. "
69 " When the Ancient Persians had a big political decision to make they would debate the matter twice: once drunk, and once sober. If they came to the same conclusion both times, they acted. "
70 " Gambling in medieval France was a simple business. All you needed were some friends, a pot, and a chicken. In fact, you didn’t need friends—you could do this with your enemies—but the pot and the chicken were essential. "
71 " Atom is Greek for unsplittable, but the Americans had discovered that by breaking the laws of etymology they were able to create vast explosions, and vast explosions were the best way of impressing the Soviets and winning the Cold War. However, "
72 " The glorious insanities of the English language mean that you can do all sorts of odd and demeaning things to a book. You can cook it. "
73 " Above all, I hope I have dispelled the bleak and imbecilic idea that the aim of writing is to express yourself clearly in plain, simple English using as few words as possible. This is a fiction, a fib, a fallacy, a fantasy, and a falsehood. To write for mere utility is as foolish as to dress for mere utility. "
74 " So Shakespeare stole; but he did wonderful things with his plunder. He's like somebody who nicks your old socks and then darns them. "
75 " Anything to do with persuasion is rhetoric, right down to the argumentum ad baculum, which means threatening somebody with a stick until they agree with you. "
76 " The Bible is chock-a-block with such unnecessary but beautiful antitheses. God, whatever his other failings, is a great rhetorician. "
77 " Epistrophe is the trope of obsession. It's the trope of emphasizing one point again and again. And it's the trope of not being able to escape that one conclusion, which is one of the reasons that songs are so suited to the idea of obsessive love, political certainty and other such unhealthy ideas. You can't reason in an epistrophic pop song. You can't seriously consider the alternatives, because the structure dictates that you'll always end up at the same point, thinking about the same girl and giving peace a chance. "
78 " If somebody learns how to phrase things beautifully, they might be able to persuade you of something that isn't true. "
79 " schoolchildren are asked to write essays on what William Blake thought about the Tiger; despite the fact that William Blake was a nutjob whose opinions, in a civilized society, would be of no interest to anybody apart from his parole officer. "
80 " Angry letters of complaint, redundancy notices and ransom notes will, if written in careful hypotaxis, sound as reasonable, measured and genial as a good dose of rough Enlightenment pornography. "