Pedantic Quotes

• For an author to write as he speaks is just as reprehensible as the opposite fault, to speak as he writes; for this gives a pedantic effect to what he says, and at the same time makes him hardly intelligible.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Writing, Opposites, Giving

  Arthur Schopenhauer (2015). “The Art of Literature: Top of Schopenhauer”, p.18, 谷月社

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• A good designer must rely on experience, on precise, logic thinking; and on pedantic exactness. No magic will do.

  Niklaus Wirth

  Death, Thinking, Design

  Interview with Carlo Pescio, www.eptacom.net. June 1997.

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• There are surely worse things than being wrong, and being dull and pedantic are surely among them.

  Mark Kac

  Dull, Being Wrong

  Mark Kac, Gian-Carlo Rota, Jacob T. Schwartz (2009). “Discrete Thoughts: Essays on Mathematics, Science and Philosophy”, p.16, Springer Science & Business Media

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• Nothing is as peevish and pedantic as men's judgments of one another.

  Desiderius Erasmus

  Men, Criticism, Pedants

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• Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime, nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.

  John Donne

  Love, Time, Rags

  'Songs and Sonnets' 'The Sun Rising'

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• 'Tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an University. But the education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman.

  William Congreve

  College, Gentleman, Littles

  'Love for Love' (1695) act 5, sc. 3

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• We do not need French post-structuralism, whose pedantic jargon, clumsy convolutions, and prissy abstractions have spread throughout academe and the arts and are now blighting the most promising minds of the next generation. This is a major crisis if there ever was one, and every sensible person must help bring it to an end.

  Camille Paglia

  Art, Mind, Needs

  Camille Paglia (2011). “Sex, Art, and American Culture: Essays”, p.8, Vintage

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• Some people are under the impression that all that is required to make a good fisherman is the ability to tell lies easily and without blushing; but this is a mistake. Mere bald fabrication is useless; the veriest tyro can manage that. It is in the circumstantial detail, the embellishing touches of probability, the general air of scrupulous - almost of pedantic - veracity, that the experienced angler is seen.

  Jerome K. Jerome

  Mistake, Lying, Air

  Jerome K. Jerome (2006). “Jerome K. Jerome: 14 Books in 1”, p.55, Shoes & Ships & Sealing Wax

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• I believe that science fiction is as profound as you want it to be or it can be very simple entertainment, and I'm all for very simple entertainment. Every now and then we all need to come home, veg-out, watch something and not think too deeply about it. It's what you want it to be. We tend to steer clear of being pedantic; it's entertainment first, otherwise we'd be on a lecture circuit.

  Joe Flanigan

  Believe, Home, Thinking

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• Facts are what pedantic, dull people have instead of opinions.

  A. A. Gill

  People, Dull, Facts

  A.A. Gill (2007). “The Angry Island: Hunting the English”, p.11, Simon and Schuster

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• People sometimes think that defining a term is pedantic and useless, but terms need to be defined if they're going to be discussed, even if the terms are only defined for a single conversation. Those involved in the conversation need to know how the terms are being used.

  Pattiann Rogers

  Thinking, People, Needs

  "A Conversation with Pattiann Rogers". Interview with Carolyn Perry, Wayne Zade, poems.com. 2009.

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• Conversation! Supple sentences, with first and second meanings and overtones beyond, outrageous challenges with cleverly planned slip-points, rebuttals of elegant brevity; deceptions and guiles, patient explanations of the obvious, fleeting allusions to the unthinkable. As a preliminary, the conversationalist must gauge the mood, the intelligence and the verbal facility of the company. To this end, a few words of pedantic exposition often prove invaluable.

  Jack Vance

  Challenges, Deception, Fleeting

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• Portraits are to daily faces As an evening west To a fine, pedantic sunshine In a satin vest.

  Emily Dickinson

  Sunshine, Portraits, West

  Emily Dickinson, Ralph William Franklin (1999). “The Poems of Emily Dickinson”, p.84, Harvard University Press

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• "Science" is pedantic, arrogant, esoteric and often insane.

  Herbert M. Shelton

  Insane, Arrogant, Esoteric

  Herbert M. Shelton (2015). “The Science and Fine Art of Fasting”, p.76, Ravenio Books

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• There is scarcely anything more important in the government of men than the exact - I will ever say pedantic - observance of the regular forms by which the guilt or innocence of accused persons is determined.

  Winston Churchill

  Men, Guilt, Important

  Winston Churchill (2015). “My African Journey”, p.42, Richard Clay & Sons

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• Busy old fool, unruly Sun, why dost thou thus through windows and through curtains call on us? Must to thy motions lovers seasons run?

  John Donne

  Love, Running, Fool

  'Songs and Sonnets' 'The Sun Rising'

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• Why is it that the less one has to say the more one says it in the most pompous and pedantic way possible?... Is it to fool the world or just to fool themselves?

  Carlos Ruiz Zafon

  World, Way, Fool

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• He had fought back with every weapon in his arsenal, being alternatively obtuse, evasive and pedantic, for it was wonderful how you could obscure an emotional issue by appearing to seek precision.

  J. K. Rowling

  Emotional, Issues, Weapons

  J.K. Rowling (2012). “The Casual Vacancy”, p.99, Hachette UK

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• I am aware of the technical distinction between ‘less’ and ‘fewer’, and between ‘uninterested’ and ‘disinterested’ and ‘infer’ and ‘imply’, but none of these are of importance to me. ‘None of these are of importance,’ I wrote there, you’ll notice – the old pedantic me would have insisted on “none of them is of importance”. Well I’m glad to say I’ve outgrown that silly approach to language

  Stephen Fry

  Silly, Language, Distinction

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• The perpetual charm of Arabia is that the traveler finds his level there simply as a human being; the people's directness, deadly to the sentimental or pedantic, likes the less complicated virtues.

  Freya Stark

  People, Arabia, Levels

  Freya Stark (2011). “A Winter in Arabia: A Journey Through Yemen”, p.92, The Overlook Press

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• The attitude of foreign to English musicians is unsympathetic, self-opinionated and pedantic. They believe that their tradition is the only one (this is specially true of the Viennese) and that anything that is not in accordance with that tradition is "wrong" and arises from insular ignorance.

  Ralph Vaughan Williams

  Attitude, Believe, Ignorance

  "R.V.W.: A Biography of Ralph Vaughan Williams". Book by Ursula Vaughan Williams, p. 243, letter to Lord Kennet (1941), 1964.

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• Just as in habiliments it is a sign of weakness to wish to make oneself noticeable by some peculiar and unaccustomed fashion, so, in language, the quest for new-fangled phrases and little-known words comes from a puerile and pedantic ambition.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Fashion, Ambition, Wish

  Michel de Montaigne (1925). “The essays of Montaigne”

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• People formerly seemed unable to evaluate a woman's c.v. or to accept a range of personal and communicative styles from the exuberant and confident to the sober and pedantic. It's much better than it was, and a number of male philosophers have been extraordinarily helpful in detecting and criticising everyday sexism in the profession.

  Catherine Wilson

  Numbers, People, Everyday

  Source: www.3ammagazine.com

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• In fact, on one occasion, a rather pedantic experimental psychologist was telling him about a long, complicated experiment he had done, incorporating all the proper controls and using considerable technical virtuosity. When he saw Crick's exasperated expression he said, "but Dr. Crick, we have got it right - we know it's right," Crick's response was, "The point is not whether it's right. The point is: does it even matter whether its right or wrong?"

  Vilayanur S. Ramachandran

  Pain, Expression, Long

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• If form is mechanically applied, it may indeed result in work that is conventional, if not pedantic or stupid. But form used well can become the very vehicle of freedom, of discovering the creative surprises that liberate mind-at-play.

  Stephen Nachmanovitch

  Stupid, Play, Creative

  Stephen Nachmanovitch (1991). “Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art”, p.84, Penguin

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