Tom Wolfe Quotes

When I need to know the meaning of a word, I look it up in a dictionary.

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

I've been obsessed with words since I was a little girl, and I am fortunate that each week as resident word expert on 'Countdown' I am ideally placed to quiz my guests in dictionary corner about the words and phrases they use.

In the secret pocket, she often kept a small pocket dictionary, which she would take out whenever she encountered a word she did not know.

I do love perusing the dictionary to find how many words I don't use - words that have specific, sharp, focused meaning. I also love the sound of certain words. I love the sound of the word pom-pom.

My favorite books are a constantly changing list, but one favorite has remained constant: the dictionary. Is the word I want to use spelled practice or practise? The dictionary knows. The dictionary also slows down my writing because it is such interesting reading that I am distracted.

I always loved reading. I always was the spelling bee champion. I always loved words. I always wanted to know what they meant, why you used them, who first said them. I was always interested in that.

One time I happened to use the word 'denigrate' onstage, and it didn't get any reaction. So as I continued my act, the left side of my brain was fast-forwarding to see if I had any other big words coming up.

The way that words fit together is always interesting to me. I love words.

Language is the ticket to plot and character, after all, because both are built out of language.

I'm a massive fan of the dictionary.

I spend a lot of my time just looking at words and grammar and writing things down that I don't know.

I'm well-read as far as literary fiction, but I wanted to make better decisions about my writing, to use words or phrases more confidently by learning how your words can be interpreted, the shades of meaning, the different connotations.

I was fascinated by the shape of words even before I knew what they meant.

A word in a dictionary is very much like a car in a mammoth motor show - full of potential but temporarily inactive.

I used to teach. I quote American history and I love words. I've read the dictionary I don't know how many times throughout my life. People say, "You read the dictionary?" I say, "Yes, and you can really believe it."

I once tried to read the dictionary. It didn't work.

I actually tried to learn the dictionary at one point. It didn't work; I only got through the first few pages.

In terms of smaller changes over time, I think good plays are like poems. Every syllable counts. So I wrestle with word choice, rhythm in final drafts.

English was my worst subject in school.

I kind of always struggled writing in Malay, because Malay is such a beautiful language. And it gets really hard, you know, if you want to make it into a song. You have to make it sound beautiful, use the right words.

I hear what they're saying. I ask my English tutor, 'What is this word 'tinkerer?''

I work with the Oxford Dictionary databases, which sounds really boring, but they're actually fascinating as they show you how current words are being used.

I keep a big, fat dictionary with me while writing.

Whatever one wishes to say, there is one noun only by which to express it, one verb only to give it life, one adjective only which will describe it. One must search until one has discovered them, this noun, this verb, this adjective, and never rest content with approximations, never resort to trickery, however happy, or to vulgarism, in order to dodge the difficulty.