The problem is that most people spend their lives looking but not truly seeing, or, as Sherlock Holmes, the meticulous English detective, declared to his partner, Dr. Watson, “You see, but you do not observe.
There is a funny story I always tell my students...when I came for the first time to the US. I didn’t speak English (Only Spanish) & I saw on every door the word “exit” which in Spanish means Success = Exito. And then I said :”No wonder Ameri...
Why should Scotland be stopped from suggesting to the English people that we join a new union under new terms? Let's not try to dominate one another. Let's be a collection, like being in the pub with a kitty. When we vote in Scotland, we vote one way...
Species do not grow more perfect: the weaker dominate the strong again and again - the reason being they are the great majority, and they are also cleverer.... Darwin forgot the mind (- that in English): the weak possess more mind. ... To acquire min...
Write. Don't talk about writing. Don't tell me about your wonderful story ideas. Don't give me a bunch of 'somedays'. Plant your ass and scribble, type, keyboard. If you have any talent at all it will leak out despite your failure to pay attention in...
…so many ticks steadily around the clock. My heart beats ferociously, as if to say it will not digest this leaving. But you are gone. I could never look into your tormenting eyes again. You mock me with each word you choose…. of the millions of w...
His head snapped sharply aside to collide with his own aching shoulder. The hulking brute he had heard referred to as Abdullah leaned into Caine’s face while his brain was yet reeling, flexing his fingers from the punch just dealt to his jaw, and s...
There was something ghost-like and insubstantial about gases to these early chemists. They called liquids that turned into gases easily, "spirits." Methyl alcohol, they called "wood spirit"; ethyl alcohol, "wine spirit." Even today, alcoholic beverag...
My mother tongue, Mende, is very expressive, very figurative, and when I write, I always struggle to find the English equivalent of things that I really want to say in Mende. For example, in Mende, you wouldn't say 'night came suddenly'; you would sa...
The English don't like concepts, really, not from a pop star. It's alright if they come from an 'intellectual,', but from a pop star you're getting ahead of yourself. Part of the class game is that you shouldn't rise above your station, and to start ...
She was opinionated without being pushy. When choosing a book to read aloud, she would try to interest him in those spunky English heroines she liked so much. He proposed Thucydides, but he understood how she, being a Quaker, did not want to read abo...
For me, growing up in Detroit, scarves meant cold weather. But I remember working in a store, and we had some silk scarves - like, wide scarves with fringe - and because I had seen the English rockers wearing skinny silk scarves, I took the scarves, ...
Col. Hans Landa: Tell me, Aldo, if I were sitting where you're sitting, would you show me mercy? Lt. Aldo Raine: Nope. Col. Hans Landa: What's that English saying about shoes and feet? Lt. Aldo Raine: 'Looks like the shoe's on the other foot.' Yeah, ...
[Aurelia meets Juliet, Mark, and Peter in the airport] Aurelia: Jamie's friends are so good looking! He never tells me this. I think, maybe now I have made the wrong choice? Picked wrong Englishman? Jamie: She can't speak English properly, she-she do...
Ulla: Goddag på dig! Leo Bloom: Uh, I beg your pardon? Ulla: Goddag på dig! Leo Bloom: Ah, gut da! Max, have you gone mad? A receptionist who can't speak English? What will people say? Max Bialystock: They'll say, "A wuma wa wa wa wa!"
Bill: You know, I heard you had a tough time last year. But they say if you make one friend on your first day you're doing okay. Charlie: Thank you, sir, but if my English teacher is the only friend I make today, that would be sorta depressing.
Quinlan: I don't speak Mexican. Let's keep it in English, Vargas. Vargas: That's all right with me. I'm sure he's just as unpleasant in any language. Sanchez: Unpleasant? Strange. I've been told I have a very winning personality. The very best shoe c...
John Chambers: Let's see. Well, this one's got an M.A. in English. She should be your screenwriter. Sometimes they go along on scouts because they want the free meals... Here's your director. Tony Mendez: Can you teach somebody to be a director in a ...
Narrator: [voice-over] Barry's first taste of battle was only a skirmish against a small rearguard of Frenchmen who occupied an orchard beside a road down which, a few hours later, the English main force would wish to pass. Though this encounter is n...
Ray: [upon being bailed out of jail by Chloë] I'll get all the money back to you as soon as I get through with me friend. Chloë: It's not a problem, Raymond. Ray: And I'll get you all your acid and ecstasy back to you, too. Chloë: [nervously to ne...
Ken: That there is called the Gruuthuse Museum. Ray: They all have funny names, don't they? Ken: Yes, Flemish. In here it says, 'The Belgians twice sheltered fugitive English Kings from being murdered, 1471 and 1651.' Ray: I used to hate history, did...
