No aphorism wants to be born a cliché; every aphorism wants to die one.
Mar 222023
Writing
If it had been your exact thought you would have used my exact words.
Mar 162023
The cure for writer’s block is speaker’s block.
Feb 232023
History has been written by the winners, as they were usually literate.
Jan 122023
With so much bad writing about, it shows a deplorable lack of public spirit that so few will do their own small part to end it.
Nov 172022
Anyone who writes enough can be rendered an idiot, or a genius, by the simple expedient of direct quotation.
Nov 082022
Almost anything can be put into a work of art, which is the artist’s problem, and almost anything can be got out of it, which is the critic’s.
Nov 042022
Footnote Zero, n. The original source of a dubious, often provably false, occasionally absurd claim repeated in numerous scholarly works.
Oct 282022
Language becomes hackneyed by always being placed in the same sterile surroundings, not by any fault of its own. Dead phrases can be revivified by bashing them against each other in a novel way, like rubbing sticks together to make a fire.
Oct 102022
Parody is the insincerest form of flattery.
Sep 222022
When everyone writes, no one reads.