#187439 - 10/26/09 05:13 AM
Quotations
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stranger
Registered: 10/26/09
Posts: 8
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Hi! First post.
I love the quotations almost as much as the words. They often are the beginning of my musings for the day.
Today's: You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts. -Khalil Gibran, mystic, poet, and artist (1883-1931).
The Accidental Tourist completely undermines the credibility of this statement. The relationship with his wife made a great impression on me. She was drawn to him because he didn't talk much. This gave him an aura of mystery and profundity. He didn't speak because he was shy and uncertain.
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#187441 - 10/26/09 06:24 AM
Re: Quotations
[Re: latishya]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 12/01/00
Posts: 12381
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A question about English usage - does posting quotes that mock the use of quotations count as irony?
I would say it does in the US. I can't speak for other dialects of English, the speakers of which think USns don't do irony because we call it something else.
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#187442 - 10/26/09 06:26 AM
Re: Quotations
[Re: latishya]
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stranger
Registered: 10/26/09
Posts: 8
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Latishya, beautiful script for your icon. Are they two different scripts? What does it mean?
'A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought.' Is true to an extent, but it also means that the quoter is making connections with previous thinkers. Our thought is based on a lifetime of absorbing, accepting or rejecting, the thoughts of others. However, to use a quotation to prove a point or end an argument is lazy.
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#187452 - 10/26/09 03:43 PM
Re: Quotations
[Re: Christine W]
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enthusiast
Registered: 11/24/07
Posts: 361
Loc: कहीं &...
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Latishya, beautiful script for your icon. Are they two different scripts? What does it mean? It is the same phrase written twice. It says "qawwali Hamesha" or "Qawwali forever". The first reads left to right and is in devanagari, the script used for Hindi (also for Marathi, Nepali, Sanskrit and others). The other reads from right to left and is Nastaliq, one of two variants of the Arabic alphabet used for Urdu. The other is Naksh. I cannot vouch for the accuracy of the Nastaliq as I don't read or write Urdu. I am planning to correct this because I think that Nastaliq is beautiful.
Edited by latishya (10/26/09 03:44 PM)
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#187457 - 10/26/09 05:53 PM
Re: Quotations
[Re: BranShea]
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veteran
Registered: 01/23/02
Posts: 1341
Loc: Virginia, USA
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"I have gathered a posie of other men’s flowers, and nothing but the thread that binds them is mine own." -- John Bartlett, if one believes Bartleby.com or Michel de Montaigne, otherwise.
Quotations can emphasize an idea or restate it pithily or to set the stage for a chapter. This sort of quote is often used in textbooks, as well as in popular books to introduce scholarly topics to the lay public. For example, I'm in my office at work now and the first book I pick up is "Principles of Artificial Intelligence" by Joscha Bach. I have not read this book yet, but it is here on the shelf waiting for me. I turn to the start of a random chapter somewhere in the middle, and I find a quote from John McCarthy (among the first AI researchers).
At other times they convey irony directly (or indirectly in the manner the quote is juxtaposed by quoter). I cannot recall a specific instance of seeing this sort of quote and only have the vaguest sense that I must have seen such a thing once or twice. Even if this fuzzy recollection is not a confabulation, this sort of quotation must be relatively rare in comparison to the other kinds.
Sometimes quotes are misused or misapplied. Quotes are termed "out of context" when, for example, they are cited in such a manner as to indicate a point other than that intended by the original author. One is led to believe that lawyers are fond of this. Often quotes out of context are used to make it appear that the person quoted has espoused something exactly contrary to what he attempts to convey. (Example: attempts to show that Darwin believed the eye could not possibly have evolved or that the fossil record disproved evolution.)
In other cases, quotes are used like slogans. We all agree that Mr. A is a wise man. Mr. A said X is true. Therefore, X is true, because he was a wise man. I will give no example of this, but I can think of several as I type this. In many cases, like this quotes can become slogans or "talking points." I suppose G. Lakoff would say that these quote /slogans are successful examples of "framing."
Scholarly works often use quotes rather than a mere citation or reference to another person's work. Maybe the wording seems so clear that the borrowing author doesn't want to spoil the original intent.
A critique or review, though, might quote every line or couplet of a poem to dissect it in the body of text.
Quotations can be used in lieu of thinking, or even to obviate thinking, or they can be used to focus or direct thinking.
I don't see how quoting can be a bad or a good thing any more than writing itself is a bad or a good thing. Rather, there are good an bad examples of each.
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#187458 - 10/26/09 07:26 PM
Re: Quotations
[Re: latishya]
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Pooh-Bah
Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 2270
Loc: R'lyeh
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qawwaliI had not known the word qavvālī والي before( link) 'singing and playing (esp. for dancing dervishes)'. No doubt of Arabic origin as so much of the Persian vocabulary of Urdu. I looked it up in a most handy online Arabic etymological lexicon ( link) 'qawwal : story-teller [qala] Hin kavval, Per qawwal borrowed from Ar.' Arabic qala 'say' from Proto-Semitic * KWL, cf. Hebrerw qol 'voice'. The Wikipedia article on qawwali ( link) tracks the Semantic shift from Arabic قَوْل ( qaul) 'utterance (of the Prophet)' to " Qawwāl is someone who often repeats (sings) a Qaul, Qawwāli is what a Qawwāl sings." My Pakistani friend Ferhiz has on more than one occasion enthused to me about Urdu language poetry. The Farsi word seems to be قوالی ( ghavvalee, link) 'a minstrel, a singer'. I am reminded of the singer of tales, Homer. There was a time when poetry, song, and tales were all one. The entry on the nastaʿlīq script [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nastaliq]link[/url) was interesting also. (Some day I must learn Arabic and Perso-Arabic script systems.)
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#187459 - 10/26/09 08:00 PM
Re: Quotations
[Re: zmjezhd]
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enthusiast
Registered: 11/24/07
Posts: 361
Loc: कहीं &...
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qawwaliI had not known the word qavvālī والي before( link) 'singing and playing (esp. for dancing dervishes)'. No doubt of Arabic origin as so much of the Persian vocabulary of Urdu. I looked it up in a most handy online Arabic etymological lexicon ( link) 'qawwal : story-teller [qala] Hin kavval, Per qawwal borrowed from Ar.' Arabic qala 'say' from Proto-Semitic * KWL, cf. Hebrerw qol 'voice'. The Wikipedia article on qawwali ( link) tracks the Semantic shift from Arabic قَوْل ( qaul) 'utterance (of the Prophet)' to " Qawwāl is someone who often repeats (sings) a Qaul, Qawwāli is what a Qawwāl sings." My Pakistani friend Ferhiz has on more than one occasion enthused to me about Urdu language poetry. The Farsi word seems to be قوالی ( ghavvalee, link) 'a minstrel, a singer'. I am reminded of the singer of tales, Homer. There was a time when poetry, song, and tales were all one. The entry on the nastaʿlīq script link was interesting also. (Some day I must learn Arabic and Perso-Arabic script systems.) That was very interesting. I would only add that I am not a follower of Sufic Islam and the qawwalis I like come from films and are different from the devotional qawwalis.
Edited by latishya (10/26/09 08:02 PM)
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#187461 - 10/26/09 09:52 PM
No end
[Re: tsuwm]
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stranger
Registered: 10/26/09
Posts: 8
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And yet of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh.
My father collected books of quotations. He never wrote anything without some added sparkle, clarity, expertise, or humour from the past. Quotations illustrated and, in his eye, validated his opinion. He took great care with his selection. I think it's my fondest memory of him. At family or other gatherings he was often asked to speak. He took the task, no matter how small, very seriously. His delivery would be ponderous because of diffidence, but he was always able to get his audience to laugh, and, as toward the end funerals became more frequent, cry.
I kept many of his books of quotations. I couldn't keep them all because I live across an ocean. My sisters expected me to send the lot to Half Price Books, but I couldn't give them up.
I do love a well-placed quotation or allusion. A bad one is an abomination. Better never to have quoted at all. I prefer mine from the books I have read myself, but it's not a hard and fast rule.
How long is a ball of string? Like the Apprentice's broom, Frankenstein's enquiry or Phaedrus' hypotheses, the search for one quotation can lead you on an ever widening gyre. At first the flesh might be strong, but the soul will weary.
As my father often said, 'There's no substitute for common sense.'
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#187466 - 10/27/09 04:45 AM
Re: Quotations
[Re: latishya]
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stranger
Registered: 10/26/09
Posts: 8
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Hi latishya. Just noticed you're online. Our time zones probably aren't that different. What does "qawwali Hamesha" or "Qawwali forever" mean to you? I'm off to work now. Have a great day everybody.
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#187468 - 10/27/09 04:49 AM
Re: Quotations
[Re: Christine W]
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enthusiast
Registered: 11/24/07
Posts: 361
Loc: कहीं &...
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Hi latishya. Just noticed you're online. Our time zones probably aren't that different. What does "qawwali Hamesha" or "Qawwali forever" mean to you? simply an expression of my love for the music. I spent all afternoon listening to a recently purchased compilation of filmi qawwalis. i love them and hope they are with me forever.
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#187476 - 10/27/09 07:16 PM
Re: Quotations
[Re: olly]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 06/23/06
Posts: 3387
Loc: Netherlands, the Hague
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[i]given by one collector
From one source/person Thanks olly, for explaining me this. 'Collector' I'd never seen used in such way and half the wisdom was lost to me.
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#187480 - 10/27/09 11:07 PM
Re: No end
[Re: Faldage]
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Pooh-Bah
Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 2270
Loc: R'lyeh
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G. CurmeGeorge Curme was an American linguist and grammarian ( link). I have his grammar of the English language from the thirties of the last century. He was one of the first descriptive linguists who wrote a grammar. It's up there with those by Jespersen and Poutsma.
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#187481 - 10/28/09 04:35 AM
Re: No end
[Re: Faldage]
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stranger
Registered: 10/26/09
Posts: 8
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So what is everyone's opinion on 'whole nuther'? Or have you discussed this already on a whole nuther thread? I've never seen it written, but we hear it all the time.
Is it a 'beautiful creation'? Or something that should be vigorously discouraged, vehemently disallowed, officially indexed and banned? Do you use it unconsciously, tolerate it impotently, or celebrate its euphony?
Just wondering.
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#187482 - 10/28/09 04:43 AM
Re: Quotations
[Re: latishya]
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stranger
Registered: 10/26/09
Posts: 8
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I've got to get me some of that stuff. I love music too but I've never heard of filmi qawwalis. I'll look it up. Many thanks for your reply.
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