David Lehman
QuotationsJargon is the verbal sleight of hand that makes the old hat seem newly fashionable; it gives an air of novelty and specious profundity to ideas that, if stated directly, would seem superficial, stale, frivolous, or false. The line between serious and spurious scholarship is an easy one to blur, with jargon on your side.
There is an air of last things, a brooding sense of impending annihilation, about so much deconstructive activity, in so many of its guises; it is not merely postmodernist but preapocalyptic.
Obscurantism is the academic theorist’s revenge on society for having consigned him or her to relative obscurity -- a way of proclaiming one’s superiority in the face of one’s diminished influence.
Words can have no single fixed meaning. Like wayward electrons, they can spin away from their initial orbit and enter a wider magnetic field. No one owns them or has a proprietary right to dictate how they will be used.
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Memorable Quotations:
Jewish Writers of the Past
Jewish Writers of the Past
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Irish Writers of the Past
Irish Writers of the Past
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Famous Teachers of the Past
Famous Teachers of the Past
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Philosophers of Western Civilization
Philosophers of Western Civilization
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American Women Writers of the Past
American Women Writers of the Past
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French Writers of the Past
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English Writers of the Past
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Massachusetts Writers of the Past
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Humorists, Wits, and Satirists of the Past
A Saigon Party:
And Other Vietnam War Short Stories
And Other Vietnam War Short Stories
Memories Are Like Clouds
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What famous people are from your state?
What famous people are from your state?
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