Superlatives Quotes:

There emanates from superlatives a destructive force.

- Elias Canetti

topic: Force, Superlatives, Emanate

Women speak in the superlative.

- Emile Souvestre

topic: Speak, Temperament, Superlatives

Whether early or late, the Parker novels are all superlative literary entertainments.

- Terry Teachout

topic: Entertainment, Novel, Superlatives

People talk fundamentals and superlatives and then make some changes of detail.

- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

topic: Change, People, Details, Superlatives

The art of advertisement, after the American manner, has introduced into all our life such a lavish use of superlatives, that no standard of value whatever is intact.

- Wyndham Lewis

source: Wyndham Lewis (1969). “Wyndham Lewis: an anthology of his prose”

topic: Art, Use, Standards, Superlatives

Some so speak in exaggerations and superlatives that we need to make a large discount from their statements before we can come at their real meaning.

- Tryon Edwards

source: Tryon Edwards (1853). “The World's Laconics: Or, The Best Thoughts of the Best Authors”, p.356

topic: Real, Needs, Speak, Superlatives

Do not put statements in the negative form. And don't start sentences with a conjunction. If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do. Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all. De-accession euphemisms. If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is. Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky. Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague.

- William Safire

topic: Editing, Long, Negative, Conjunctions, Trendy

When the first-rate author wants an exquisite heroine or a lovely morning, he finds that all the superlatives have been worn shoddy by his inferiors. It should be a rule that bad writers must start with plain heroines and ordinary mornings, and, if they are able, work up to something better.

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

topic: Morning, Lovely, Ordinary, Superlatives

From scarlet to powdered gold, to blazing yellow, to the rare ashen emerald, to the orange and black velvet of your shimmering corselet, out to the tip that like an amber thorn begins you, small, superlative being, you are a miracle, and you blaze

- Pablo Neruda

topic: Beauty, Yellow, Orange, Blazing, Superlatives

Woman is superlative; the best leader in life, the best guide in happy days, the best consoler in sorrow.

- Johann Gottfried Seume

topic: Women, Leader, Sorrow, Superlatives

Progress is a comparative of which we have not settled the superlative.

- Gilbert K. Chesterton

source: Gilbert K. Chesterton (2013). “The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton”, p.135, Simon and Schuster

topic: Progress Of Society, Progress, Cult, Superlatives

A man coined to superlative must expect that his every statement will be taken with some caution

- Claude C. Hopkins

topic: Taken, Writing, Men, Superlatives

Americans specially love superlatives. The phrases 'biggest in the world,' 'finest in the world,' are on all lips.

- Isabella Bird

source: Isabella L. Bird (2012). “A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains”, p.128, Courier Corporation

topic: United States, Phrases, World, Superlatives

For Rat Kiley, I think, facts were formed by sensation, not the other way around, and when you listened to one of his stories, you'd find yourself performing rapid calculations in your head, subtracting superlatives, figuring the square root of an absolute and then multiplying by maybe.

- Tim O'Brien

topic: Thinking, Squares, Roots, Multiplying, Square Roots

"Best in the world," "lowest price in existence, " etc are at best claiming the expected. But superlative of that sort are usually damaging. They suggestion looseness of expression, a tendency to exaggerate, a careless truth. They lead readers to discount all the statements that you make

- Claude C. Hopkins

topic: Writing, Expression, World, Looseness, Superlatives

A single overstatement, wherever or however it occurs, diminishes the whole, and a carefree superlative has the power to destroy, for the reader, the object of the writer's enthusiasm.

- E. B. White

source: William Strunk Jr., E.B. White (1962). “the Elements of Style”

topic: Enthusiasm, Carefree, Reader, Diminish, Superlatives

This is me apologizing. I am a fool, a bird-brain, a liar and a horse-thief. I wouldn't touch a superlative again with an umbrella.

- Dorothy Parker

source: Dorothy Parker (1970). “A month of Saturdays: thirty-one famous pieces by "Constant Reader"”

topic: Horse, Liars, Bird, This Is Me, Superlatives

It behooves us to avoid archaisms. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.

- William Safire

topic: Writing, Long, Use, Long Words, Superlatives

Poets and writers who are in love with the superlative all want to do more than they can.

- Friedrich Nietzsche

topic: Poetry, Want, Exaggeration, Superlatives

The moral sense reappears today with the same morning newness that has been from of old the fountain of beauty and strength. You say there is no religion now. 'Tis like saying in rainy weather, There is no sun, when at that moment we are witnessing one of its superlative effects.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

source: Ralph Waldo Emerson (1860). “The Conduct of Life”, p.187

topic: Religious, Morning, Weather, Rainy Weather, Superlatives

[Chicago] is the greatest and most typically American of all cities. New York is bigger and more spectacular and can outmatch it in other superlatives, but it is a "world" city, more European in some respects than American.

- John Gunther

topic: Respect, New York, Cities, Superlatives

Faction is to party what the superlative is to the positive. Party is a political evil, and faction is the worst of all parties.

- Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke

topic: Party, Evil, Political, Factions, Superlatives

Examples of exaggeration can be found in almost any advertising medium. The use of the superlative is altogether too prevalent. 'The finest,' 'the best,' 'the greatest,' 'the purest,' 'the most economical,' and so on ad infinitum, are hurled at the public everywhere. Surely not all products of the same class can be the best or the finest.

- Daniel Starch

source: Daniel Starch (1914). “Advertising: Its Principles, Practice, and Technique”

topic: Class, Example, Use, Superlatives

Wilderness is rapidly becoming one of those aspects of the American dream which is more of the past than of the present. Wilderness is not only a condition of nature, but a state of mind and mood and heart. It cannot be confined to the museum-case status—seen only as a passing diorama from superlative throughways.

- Ansel Adams

source: Ansel Adams (1981). “Celebrating the American Earth: a Portfolio”

topic: Dream, Heart, Past, Superlatives

Either the men of Galilee were men of superlative wisdom, and extensive knowledge and experience, and of deeper skill in the arts of deception than any and all others, before them or after them, or they have truly stated astonishing things which they saw and heard.

- Simon Greenleaf

source: Simon Greenleaf (1847). “An Examination of the Testimony of the Four Evangelists by the Rules of Evidence Administered in Courts of Justice: With an Account of the Trial of Jesus”, p.47

topic: Art, Men, Skills, Superlatives

Such exaggerations have been so common that the public takes them with a grain of salt and partly excuses them as being due to the advertiser's license of self-assertiveness. Nevertheless, the fact remains that superlative generalities are weak arguments and far less convincing than a statement of facts. Much advertising copy would be improved immensely by doing away with brag and substituting actual facts about the merits of the article.

- Daniel Starch

topic: Self, Would Be, Salt, Assertiveness, Generalities

What but education has advanced us beyond the condition of our indigenous neighbors? And what chains them to their present state of barbarism and wretchedness but a bigoted veneration for the supposed superlative wisdom of their fathers and the preposterous idea that they are to look backward for better things and not forward, longing, as it should seem, to return to the days of eating acorns and roots rather than indulge in the degeneracies of civilization?

- Thomas Jefferson

source: Thomas Jefferson (1976). “Thomas Jefferson, revolutionary philosopher: a selection of writings”, Barron's Educational Series

topic: Father, Civilization, Ideas, Superlatives

People who know their worth can live austerely; it's the people nagged by the gnawing knowledge of their own cheapness who have that eternal necessity for submerging themselves in what they feel is superlative in material things, as if fine possessions could make them fine.

- Mabel Seeley

topic: People, Fine, Possession, Superlatives, Cheapness

Learn the value of a man's words and expressions, and you know him. Each man has a measure of his own for everything; this he offers you inadvertently in his words. He who has a superlative for everything wants a measure for the great or small.

- Johann Kaspar Lavater

topic: Men, Expression, Want, Superlatives

The national parklands have a major role in providing superlative opportunities for outdoor recreation, but they have other people serving values. They can provide an experience in conservation education for the young people of the country; they can enrich our literary and artistic consciousness; they can help create social values; contribute to our civic consciousness; remind us of our debt to the land of our fathers.

- Stewart Udall

topic: Country, Father, Opportunity, Outdoor Recreation, Superlatives

The guardian and arbiter of superlative eating, with every meal an unforgettable experience in pleasure, starting with the soup, which he said, 'must be the agent provocateur of a good dinner.'

- Marie-Antoine Careme

topic: Meals, Agents, Soup, Superlatives

I needed people to deliver my feelings back to me in a form that was legible. Which is a superlative kind of empathy to seek, or to supply: an empathy that rearticulates more clearly what it's shown.

- Leslie Jamison

source: Leslie Jamison (2014). “The Empathy Exams: Essays”, p.16, Granta Books

topic: People, Empathy, Feelings, Superlatives

Men can have an obvious display of heroics or strength or accomplishment, but it is the unsung women throughout all ages of humankind who have endured with superlative strength, beauty and love, often with secret suffering, that deserve absolute respect and acknowlegement. They are the true heroes of humanity. They are the champions who have birthed and nurtured us, who have held us together at the most integral level, when men seemed intent only on tearing apart the fabric of life for irrelevant ideals.

- Red Haircrow

topic: Love, Hero, Men, True Hero, Superlatives

Ronnie Moran, Joe Fagan, Bob Paisley, Roy Evans - they were hard on us young players. If you got a 'well done' off Ronnie Moran, you must have played well... They never used superlatives at Liverpool.

- Paul Jewell

topic: Player, Done, Bob, Paisley, Superlatives

The person who screams, or uses the superlative degree, or converses with heat puts whole drawing-rooms to flight. If you wish to be loved, love measure.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

source: Ralph Waldo Emerson (2015). “Emerson's Essays: Top Essays”, p.88, 谷月社

topic: Drawing, Wish, Degrees, Superlatives

He who would be singular in his apparel had need have something superlative to balance that affectation.

- Owen Feltham

topic: Balance, Would Be, Needs, Singularity, Apparel

I think drugs are like strawberries and peaches.

- Edie Sedgwick

topic: Thinking, Drug, Peaches, Strawberries, Superlatives

The blessings of fortune are the lowest; the next are the bodily advantages of strength and health; but the superlative blessings, in fine, are those of the mind.

- Roger L'Estrange

topic: Blessing, Mind, Next, Superlatives

It isn't often that a writer of superlative skills knows enough about flying to write well about it.

- Samuel Hynes

topic: Airplane, Writing, Skills, Superlatives

Supernatural is a dangerous and difficult word in any of its senses, looser or stricter. But to fairies it can hardly be applied, unless super is taken merely as a superlative prefix. For it is man who is, in contrast to fairies, supernatural; whereas they are natural, far more natural than he. Such is their doom.

- J. R. R. Tolkien

topic: Taken, Men, Fairy, Superlatives

Light is my inspiration, my paint and brush. It is as vital as the model herself. Profoundly significant, it caresses the essential superlative curves and lines. Light I acknowledge as the energy upon which all life on this planet depends.

- Ruth Bernhard

topic: Photography, Inspiration, Curves, Superlatives

Last week, I had to offer my publisher a bottle that was far too good for him simply because there was nothing between the insulting and the superlative.

- A. J. Liebling

topic: Wine, Insulting, Bottles, Good Wine, Superlatives

Taste and smell are often the beggars among our five senses - they leave no written language and therefore no standards other than wholly personal ones. Tasting a superlative Moselle wine can be an aesthetic experience no less genuine than hearing a Mozart piano concerto or seeing for the first time an original Breughel painting.

- Frank Schoonmaker

topic: Wine, Piano, Smell, Written Language, Superlatives

My pride and my power of vision were all that I owned when I started - and whatever I achieved, was achieved by means of them. Both are greater now. Now I have the knowledge of the superlative value I had missed: of my right to be proud of my vision. The rest is mine to reach.

- Ayn Rand

source: Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.657, Hamilton Books

topic: Knowledge, Mean, Pride, Superlatives

I'm greedy; I'd like to keep most of it for myself and a few others, a few of my friends . . . to keep that superlative high, just on the cusp of each day . . . so that I'd radiate sunshine.

- Edie Sedgwick

source: "Edie : American Girl". Book by Jean Stein and George Plimpton, 1982.

topic: Superlatives, Cusp

Some have a violent and turgid manner of talking and thinking; they are always in extremes, and pronounce concerning everything in the superlative.

- Isaac Watts

topic: Thinking, Talking, Violent, Superlatives

Allen Anderson speaks from the heart about subjects he loves; this enthralls audiences everywhere. His outlook is realistic but invariably positive, encouraging everyone to expect the best. Audience feedback is replete with superlatives.

- Henry Koster

topic: Heart, Speak, Realistic, Speak From The Heart, Superlatives

Put in the superlatives yourselves, I'm running out. It's already been a while now that he has been outstanding. He's more than decisive in every way. That he's capable of doing everything that he does at his age is something impressive, that doesn't make any sense.

- Pep Guardiola

source: "Lionel Messi Is the Best Player Ever, Claims Barcelona President". www.theguardian.com. March 22, 2010.

topic: Running, Age, Way, Superlatives

Frank Sinatra was very devoted to what it was he did. At the end of his life, what he had left - there have been accolades, mementos, festivals, superlatives, all that stuff. He's done movies, TV, done this, done that - what he had left was a love of his audience, and that kept him alive.

- Frank Sinatra, Jr.

source: Source: www.news-journalonline.com

topic: Done, Alive, Festivals, Memento, Superlatives