David Crystal Quotes

Part of the joy and pleasure of English is its boundless creativity: I can describe a new machine as bicyclish, I can say that I'm vitamining myself to stave off a cold, I can complain that someone is the smilingest person I've ever seen, and I can decide, out of the blue, that 'fetch' is now the word I want to use to mean 'cool.'

I mangle phrases constantly. The other day I was chatting with my boyfriend and I said to him, 'He really sold him under the bus.' And he said, 'I think you meant 'threw him under the bus,' or 'sold him up the river.'

People love to drop in 'you betcha' as often as they can.

How did females become 'guys?' How did everyone become 'guys?' Remember, too, that a male guy was something of a scoundrel. And a wise guy was a fresh kid, a whippersnapper. In its most other famous evocation, men in Brooklyn said 'youse guys.' Damon Runyon referred to hustlers, gamblers, and other nefarious types as guys.

Whenever I write lyrics and an Americanism slips in, I always cut it straight out. I can't use the word 'babe,' for instance. It makes me cringe.

I was able to make up lots of portementos, literally hundreds and hundreds of words... See, I find that mine don't have any meanings. They're not proper. Although I've got a great dictionary of them. It's like the Cockney rhyming slang or something.

Oh, this I have to see. I love it when you go for the vernacular. Jugular.

Eke wonder last but nine deies never in toun.

Correct English is the slang of prigs.

Hit records create slang, and if you create slang, you get into a broader conversation level.

The longest word in the world is "a word from our sponsor."

I have this little thing that people call Keegan-ese, where I don't speak English words at all. I just say stuff like, "You gotta toish the doish and you gotta maloish the hoish."

Oh you two look delicious," Bast said, licking her lips. "No, no-er, I mean wonderful. Now, off you go!

She heard pa shouting,"Jiminy crickets!It's raining fish-hooks and hammer handles!

You can't spell bass without ass

Three hot chicks for three hot chicks." "THEY'RE NOT CHICKS! THEY'RE DUCKS!

My trademark saying is probably “VAS HAPPENIN?!”

I went to a 7-11 and asked for a 2x4 and a box of 3x5's. The clerk said, "ten-four."

I've found that there are only two kinds that are any good: slang that has established itself in the language, and slang that you make up yourself. Everything else is apt to be passe before it gets into print.

A policeman stopped me and said: Would you please blow into this bag, sir? I said: What for, officer? He said: My chips are too hot.

A bit of talcum Is always walcum.

One time I said to Jordan [Peele], in a text, "I will pick you up at 2:30. So if you're just standing out in front of the building, we'll go from there to the next meeting. Cool?" And my man just writes, "Wordness to the turdness."

He toss my salad like his name Romaine

The other day I was playing Scrabble. I saw that I could close the space in D-E- -Y. I had an N and an F. Which do you think I chose? What was the word I made?

You bet your Grannie's Panties I will.