I like dialogue that is slightly more brittle than life. I have always admired and wished to write one of those 1940s film scripts where every line is written with a sharpness and economy that is frankly artificial.
I have been an 'Official' all my life, without the least turn for it. I never could attain a true official manner, which is highly artificial and handles trifles with ludicrously disproportionate gravity.
Continuous present is all we have, and stream of consciousness - which in a novel is arguably just as artificial as the stilted dialogue that you get in most conventional novels. They're all stratagems to try to get closer to the texture of lived lif...
The quality of his being one with the people, of having no artificial or natural barriers between him and them, made it possible for him to be a leader without ever being or thinking of being a dictator.
People's social networks do not consist only of people they see face to face. In fact, social networks have been extending because of artificial media since the printing press and the telephone.
When you're onstage with an electric band going through a massive P.A. system, it's very artificial. You can't really hear your own voice as it comes out of your mouth.
TV producers want ratings and are willing to do nearly anything to get them. They gin up artificial conflicts and create an urgency for even the most minor of economic data points.
Reckless predictions of the second coming of Christ create an artificial excitement among believers followed by a corresponding depression. In addition, it hardens skeptics in their unbelief and provides new fodder for cynics to mock the Christian fa...
[Derek Smalls sets off a metal detector at the airport] Airport Security Officer: Do you have any artificial plates or limbs? Derek Smalls: Er, not really.
Ryan Bingham: All the things you probably hate about travelling -the recycled air, the artificial lighting, the digital juice dispensers, the cheap sushi- are warm reminders that I'm home
Prayer does not use up artificial energy, doesn't burn up any fossil fuel, doesn't pollute. Neither does song, neither does love, neither does the dance.
I hope to repair certain important connections burned through by artificial speed, by inattentiveness. I walk, as everyone does, to see what lies ahead. I walk to remember.
The aim of every artist is to arrest motion, which is life, by artificial means and hold it fixed so that a hundred years later, when a stranger looks at it, it moves again since it is life.
But this emphasis would be lavished in vain, if it served, in your opinion, only to abstract a general type from phenomena whose particularity in our work would remain the essential thing for you, and whose original arrangement could be broken up onl...
To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization.
Hamlet is an astonishing intelligence.
There is a lot of strength and intelligence in Hollywood.
I want to exude strength and intelligence.
Teachers seeking to 'teach the controversy' over Darwinian evolution in today's climate will likely be met with false warnings that it is unconstitutional to say anything negative about Darwinian evolution. Students who attempt to raise questions abo...
E ... intelligent design people! They're just buck-toothed, Bible-pushing nincompoops with community-college degrees who're trying to sell a gussied-up creationism to a cretinous public! No need to address their concerns or respond to their arguments...
Desire as a motivator for achievement and even for survival isn't a bad thing. It's when desire drives us to grab more than our share or harm others that issues arise.
