Quote

At a certain point, what people mean when they use a word becomes its meaning.

William Safire

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

William Safire
Age: 79 †
Born: 1929
Born: December 17
Died: 2009
Died: September 27
Author
Columnist
Journalist
Writer
New York City
New York
William Lewis Safire
Meaning
Becomes
Word
Point
Use
Certain
Mean
People

More quotes by William Safire

Image
A reader should be able to identify a column without its byline or funny little picture on top purely by look or feel, or its turgidity ratio.
William Safire
Image
The Latin motto over Poindexter's new Pentagon office reads Scientia Est Potentia - knowledge is power. Exactly: the government's infinite knowledge about you is its power over you.
William Safire
Image
President Reagan is a rhetorical roundheels, as befits a politician seeking empathy with his audience.
William Safire
Image
I welcome new words, or old words used in new ways, provided the result is more precision, added color or greater expressiveness.
William Safire
Image
A book should have an intellectual shape and a heft that comes with dealing with a primary subject.
William Safire
Image
Different regions may require different strategies, as President Bush has noted, but not different basic principles. It's either collective security or selective security.
William Safire
Image
I want my questions answered by an alert and experienced politician, prepared to be grilled and quoted -- not my hand held by an old smoothie.
William Safire
Image
Create your own constituency of the infuriated.
William Safire
Image
Dangling punch lines to forgotten stories remain in the language like the smile of the Cheshire cat.
William Safire
Image
Avoid overuse of 'quotation “marks.”'
William Safire
Image
Knowing how things work is the basis for appreciation, and is thus a source of civilized delight.
William Safire
Image
One difference between French appeasement and American appeasement is that France pays ransom in cash and gets its hostages back while the United States pays ransom in arms and gets additional hostages taken.
William Safire
Image
The wonderful thing about being a New York Times columnist is that it's like a Supreme Court appointment - they're stuck with you for a long time.
William Safire
Image
The most successful column is one that causes the reader to throw down the paper in a peak of fit.
William Safire
Image
By elevating your reading, you will improve your writing or at least tickle your thinking.
William Safire
Image
Only in grammar can you be more than perfect.
William Safire
Image
To communicate, put your words in order give them a purpose use them to persuade, to instruct, to discover, to seduce.
William Safire
Image
What a joy it is to see really professional media manipulation.
William Safire
Image
The right to do something does not mean that doing it is right.
William Safire
Image
In dealing with Syria's dictator...only force counts. No cease-fire was attainable in Lebanon until the 16-inch guns of the battleship New Jersey started shelling Syria's proxies suddenly, sweet reason prevailed in Damascus.
William Safire