Best Dictionary Quotes

If a word in the dictionary were misspelled, how would we know?

Oprah played a big role in my understanding of what it meant to be female and to really step into your own power. I wouldn’t even call her a role model; she was literally a reference point. You have the dictionary, you have the Bible, you have Oprah.

The dictionary has been in the making for several decades, and the result is well worth the wait. MacLean and those who worked with her have consulted with Iñupiaq speakers from across Alaska’s North Slope to compile a comprehensive collection of word stems, along with postbases, grammatical endings, and an array of other valuable material. . . . This dictionary will prove fascinating for anyone interested in the Iñupiat and their language.

[Instead of collecting stamps, he collected dictionaries and encyclopaedias:] Because you can learn more from them.

First book was handwritten, then the printing press, now we’ve got our Kindles. To be able to push a button and a dictionary comes up. And then, at my age, that I can make the letters any size I want, and that I can carry all of William Shakespeare, all of Gogol, all of Franz Kafka in my handbag? You’ve got to love it.

My lad chewed and swallowed a dictionary. We gave him Epsom salts – but we can’t get a word out of him.

Look up the definition of rejection in the dictionary, get really comfortable with it, and then maybe you can go into acting.

Dictionaries stop where the heart starts.

Dictionary is the only place that success comes before work. Hard work is the price we must pay for success. I think you can accomplish anything if you’re willing to pay the price.

The provisions of the Constitution are not mathematical formulas having their essence in their form; they are organic, living institutions transplanted from English soil. Their significance is vital, not formal; it is to be gathered not simply by taking the words and a dictionary, but by considering their origin and the line of their growth.

I am the sole author of the dictionary that defines me.

If you look up the definition of news in the dictionary, it isn’t what you watch on TV.

Every time I have to look up a word in the dictionary, I’m delighted.

The multiplicity of facts and writings is become so great that every thing must soon be reduced to extracts and dictionaries.

The Devil will use our words and his dictionary.

I put a Phrygian cap on the old dictionary.

For two thousand years Christianity has been telling us: life is death, death is life; it is high time to consult the dictionary.

I am an unmarried man, as opposed to a single man. A bachelor, according to the dictionary, is a man who has never been married. An unmarried man is not married at the moment. Many of these terms have fallen into disuse.

Please be SILENT and LISTEN. I am the SCHOOLMASTER and you are in the CLASSROOM. Just like ELEVEN PLUS TWO equals TWELVE PLUS ONE, And even a FUNERAL can be REAL FUN, You will find my DICTIONARY is quite INDICATORY. If you want to read my story, just look… THEN UNREAD.

In a partner I’m looking for an encyclopedia and a dictionary. A bit of the Boy Scouts Handbook. A person who is conscientious about the trail he leaves behind him. Love. Unconditional kindness. Basically, I’m looking for the qualities I revere in my friends.

Trickle-down theories do not address the legitimate aspirations of the poor. We must lift those at the bottom so that poverty is erased from the dictionary of modern India.

Sound is the vocabulary of nature… noises are as well articulated as the words in a dictionary… Opposing the world of sound is the world of music.

I love learning about different dialects and I own all sorts of regional and time-period slang dictionaries. I often browse through relevant ones while writing a story. I also read a lot of diaries and oral histories.

My pet peeve and my goal in life is to somehow get an adjective for ‘integrity’ in the dictionary. ‘Truthful’ doesn’t really cover it, or ‘genuine.’ It should be like ‘integritus.’

When you look in the dictionary for the most important word, do you know what it is? It could be remember.Because all of you have made covenants-you know what to do and you know how to do it-our greatest need is to remember.

What I liked about Greece was […] the impressive force of the language itself, unconfined by dictionaries, spoken in the streets, in cafés and in the country.

Symbols and emblems were everywhere. Buildings and pictures were designed to be read like books. Everything stood for something else; if you had the right dictionary, you could read Nature itself. It was hardly surprising to find philosophers using the symbolism of their time to interpret knowledge that came from a mysterious source.

My work is play. And I play when I design. I even looked it up in the dictionary, to make sure that I actually do that, and the definition of play, number one, was engaging in a childlike activity or endeavor, and number two was gambling. And I realize I do both when I’m designing.

Fail, it’s not in my dictionary. I’ve got a good dictionary up there and the words ‘fail’ and ‘failure’ have been ruled out for years. I don’t know what people are talking about who use that word. All I do know is temporary non-success, even if I’ve got to wait another 20 years for what I’m after, and I try to put that into people, no matter what their object in life.

The word ‘Sudra’ which means ‘Son of prostitute’ should not find a place even in the history hereafter. We will not allow it to find a place in the dictionary or encycl

The dictionary is a closed system in which someone interested in the meaning of a word can go around and around and end up exactly where he started, simply because words are defined in terms of other words, and these, in turn, are defined in terms of still other words.

For my Oxford degree, I had to translate French and German philosophy (as it turned out, Descartes and Kant) at sight without a dictionary. That meant Germany for my first summer vacation, to learn the thorny language on my own.

The dictionary contains no metaphors.

Empty teacups gathered around her and dictionary pages fell at her feet.

The only place where compensation comes before service is in the dictionary or anywhere the government meddles.