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Quotations about brevity
Note that not all quotations have been tagged, so the Search function may find additional quotations on this topic.
Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrongs.
Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855) British novelist [pseud. Currer Bell]
Jane Eyre, ch. 6 [Helen Burns] (1847)
(Source)
A sacrifice, if we may say so, to the god Brevity, whom all historians, indeed, all who work with the written word, ought to worship.
Brevity is the soul of lingerie.
Dorothy Parker (1893-1967) American writer
Caption, Vogue (1916)
Quoted and attributed in Alexander Woollcott, While Rome Burns (1934). Modeled after Shakespeare.
Brevity is the soul of wit.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Hamlet, Act 2, sc. 2 [Polonius] (1600)
(Source)
In full:
"Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief ...."
Whatever advice you give, be short.
The more you say, the less people remember.
The fewer the words, the greater the profit.François de Sales (1567-1622) French bishop, saint, writer [a.k.a. Francis de Sales, b. François de Boisy]
(Attributed)
In S.A. Bent, comp., Familiar Short Sayings of Great Men (1887). Usually attributed, due to structure of that reference, to Francois Fénelon.
If you have anything to tell me of importance, for God’s sake begin at the end.
Brevity is the best recommendation of speech, whether in a senator or an orator.
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
(Attributed)
(Source)
In Tryon Edwards, A Dictionary of Thoughts (1891).
Brevity is the sister of talent.
The more an idea is developed, the more concise becomes its expression; the more a tree is pruned, the better is the fruit.
There’s a great power in words, if you don’t hitch too many of them together.
Be brief, for no discourse can please when too long.
I don’t care how much a man talks, if he only says it in a few words.
You may get a large amount of truth into a brief space.
There was a pause — just long enough for an angel to pass, flying slowly.
How long is life to the wretched, how short for the happy!
Struggling to be brief
I become obscure.[Brevis esse laboro,
obscurus fio.]