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Adapt your style, if you wish, to admit the color of slang or freshness of neologism, but hang tough on clarity, precision, structure, grace.

William Safire

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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
Admit
Structure
Tough
Slang
Color
Freshness
Grace
Precision
Style
Adapt
Wish
Hang
Clarity

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Sir Alec Douglas-Home, when he was British Foreign Secretary, said he received the following telegram from an irate citizen: To hell with you. Offensive letter follows.
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The Republicans do not look on the Democrats as the evil empire.
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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.
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Color and bite permeate a language designed to rally many men, to destroy some, and to change the minds of others.
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The most fun in breaking a rule is in knowing what rule you're breaking.
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As long as one American is hungry... then we have unfinished business in this country.
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I'm willing to zap conservatives when they do things that are not libertarian.
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If America cannot win a war in a week, it begins negotiating with itself.
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The CEO era gave rise to the CFO (not certified flying object, as you might imagine, but chief financial officer) and, most recently, the CIO, chief investment officer, a nice boost for the bookkeeper you can't afford to give a raise . . .
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I welcome new words, or old words used in new ways, provided the result is more precision, added color or greater expressiveness.
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After eating, an epicure gives a thin smile of satisfaction a gastronome, burping into his napkin, praises the food in a magazine a gourmet, repressing his burp, criticizes the food in the same magazine a gourmand belches happily and tells everybody where he ate a glutton empraces the white porcelain alter, or more plainly, he barfs.
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Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague.
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Don't expect others to do your work for you.
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When articulation is impossible, gesticulation comes to the rescue.
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To 'know your place' is a good idea in politics. That is not to say 'stay in your place' or 'hang on to your place', because ambition or boredom may dictate upward or downward mobility, but a sense of place - a feel for one's own position in the control room-is useful in gauging what you should try to do.
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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.
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Adjective salad is delicious, with each element contributing its individual and unique flavor but a puree of adjective soup tastes yecchy.
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Writers who used to show off their erudition no longer sing in the bare ruined choir of the media.
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The right to do something does not mean that doing it is right.
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Took me a while to get to the point today, but that is because I did not know what the point was when I started.
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