We burned with love for ourselves, all of us, starters of the fire we suffered- our love was the affliction for which only our love was the cure.
Jonathan Safran FoerRead
She wanted more, more slang, more figures of speech, the bee's knees, the cats pajamas, horse of a different color, dog-tired, she wanted to talk like she was born here, like she never came from anywhere else
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote expresses a desire for authentic expression and connection through colloquial language.
In this quote, the character longs for a deeper connection to her surroundings by immersing herself in the local vernacular. It highlights the role of language and slang as a means of identity and belonging, suggesting that to truly integrate into a new environment, one must adopt its cultural language and expressions.
Themes
LanguageIdentityBelongingSlangExpression
In practice
Example use cases
An author might use this quote in a workshop about the importance of local dialects in storytelling.
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Similar quotes
I'm about as monolingual as you come, but nevertheless, I have a variety of different languages at my command, different styles, different ways of talking, which do involve different parameter settings.
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Dangling punch lines to forgotten stories remain in the language like the smile of the Cheshire cat.
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Part of what makes a language 'alive' is its constant evolution. I would hate to think Britain would ever emulate France, where they actually have a learned faculty whose job it is to attempt to prevent the incursion of foreign words into the language. I love editing Harry with Arthur Levine, my American editor-the differences between 'British English' (of which there must be at least 200 versions) and 'American English' (ditto!) are a source of constant interest and amusement to me.
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Purists behave as if there was a vintage year when language achieved a measure of excellence which we should all strive to maintain. In fact, there was never such a year. The language of Chaucer's or Shakespeare's time was no better and no worse than that of our own - just different.
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A standard international language should not only be simple, regular, and logical, but also rich and creative.
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