Quote

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

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
Feels
Funny
Ratio
Littles
Ratios
Able
Column
Look
Columns
Little
Purely
Without
Identify
Looks
Picture
Feel
Reader

More quotes by William Safire

Image
By elevating your reading, you will improve your writing or at least tickle your thinking.
William Safire
Image
Color and bite permeate a language designed to rally many men, to destroy some, and to change the minds of others.
William Safire
Image
When I need to know the meaning of a word, I look it up in a dictionary.
William Safire
Image
Decide on some imperfect Somebody and you will win, because the truest truism in politics is: You can't beat Somebody with Nobody.
William Safire
Image
What a joy it is to see really professional media manipulation.
William Safire
Image
Never look for the story in the 'lede.' Reporters are required to put what's happened up top, but the practiced pundit places a nugget of news, even a startling insight, halfway down the column, directed at the politiscenti. When pressed for time, the savvy reader starts there.
William Safire
Image
Do not be taken in by 'insiderisms.' Fledgling columnists, eager to impress readers with their grasp of journalistic jargon, are drawn to such arcane spellings as 'lede.' Where they lede, do not follow.
William Safire
Image
No one flower can ever symbolize this nation. America is a bouquet.
William Safire
Image
Gridlock is great. My motto is, 'Don't just do something. Stand there.'
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
Some handsome and ambitious men believe they are above all morality, and a woman's virtue becomes a mere challenge to them.
William Safire
Image
Sometimes I know the meaning of a word but am tired of it and feel the need for an unfamiliar, especially precise or poetic term, perhaps one with a nuance that flatters my readership's exquisite sensitivity.
William Safire
Image
Of higher value than any one leader is the cause.
William Safire
Image
Create your own constituency of the infuriated.
William Safire
Image
A man who lies, thinking it is the truth, is an honest man, and a man who tells the truth, believing it to be a lie, is a liar.
William Safire
Image
Avoid overuse of 'quotation “marks.”'
William Safire
Image
We are all environmentalists now, but we are not all planetists. An environmentalist realizes that nature has its pleasures and deserves respect. A planetist puts the earth ahead of the earthlings.
William Safire
Image
Knowing how things work is the basis for appreciation, and is thus a source of civilized delight.
William Safire
Image
One challenge to the arts in America is the need to make the arts, especially the classic masterpieces, accessible and relevant to today's audience.
William Safire
Image
On the analogy of 'Dictionary Johnson,' we call Fred R. Shapiro, editor of the just-published Yale Book of Quotations (well worth the $50 price), 'Quotationeer Shapiro.' Shapiro does original research, earning his 1,067-page volume a place on the quotation shelf next to Bartlett's and Oxford's.
William Safire