Misread Quotes & Sayings

Shakespeare said that art is a mirror held up to nature. And that's what it is. The nature is your nature, and all of these wonderful poetic images of mythology are referring to something in you. When your mind is trapped by the image out there so that you never make the reference to yourself, you have misread the image.
The inner world is the world of your requirements and your energies and your structure and your possibilities that meets the outer world. And the outer world is the field of your incarnation. That's where you are. You've got to keep both going. As Novalis said, 'The seat of the soul is there where the inner and outer worlds meet. — Joseph Campbell

There is an underlying rhythm to all text. Sentences crashing fall like the waves of the sea, and work unconsciously on the reader. Punctuation is the music of language. As a conductor can influence the experience of the song by manipulating its rhythm, so can punctuation influence the reading experience, bring out the best (or worst) in a text. By controlling the speed of a text, punctuation dictates how it should be read. A delicate world of punctuation lives just beneath the surface of your work, like a world of microorganisms living in a pond. They are missed by the naked eye, but if you use a microscope you will find a exist, and that the pond is, in fact, teeming with life. This book will teach you to become sensitive to this habitat. The more you do, the greater the likelihood of your crafting a finer work in every respect. Conversely the more you turn a blind eye, the greater the likelihood of your creating a cacophonous text and of your being misread. — Noah Lukeman

Sometimes change is necessary. Sometimes we recognize the need for it, but we don't know how to achieve it. We misread its nature. We think it is beyond us, failing to recognize that our inability to act is a problem of our own making. Change is the solution we require, but it is not a goal that is easily reached. Identifying and disposing of what is troubling to us requires caution and understanding. — Terry Brooks

I think writers can gain a lot of vitality from being misread. — Matthew Specktor

She pursued his lips,' Zach laughs. 'Another one I misread! Pursued for "pursed." You know. She pursed her lips. So whenever you do that now, reach out and touch my lips to shut me up? I think, she pursued his lips.'

'That's so silly,' smiles Rachel.

'I know that. Now I'm pursuing your lips,' he adds.

When Zach kisses her, Rachel is often aware of the pulse in his lower labial, a small heartbeat there. She is aware of a pulsing and a slight thickening of tissue. How many times has this boy bled from his mouth? How many times. — Emma Richler

Some Kennedy aides have always insisted that Johnson misread J.F.K.'s plans for Vietnam. They say that Kennedy had begun to rethink the U.S. presence in Indochina and was reluctant to increase it. — Robert Dallek

She didn't give a damn about some of them, but she had grown to learn that inattention can be a stratagem to avoid pain, and that it is often misread as shallowness and indifference. — Thomas Harris

Don't see the mind for more than it is, but don't misread it for all that it can be. — Jim Rohn

You are unnerving the hell out of me, Valkyrie."
"oh" she frowned, petting her bat fitfully " I must have misread the future for the past." she shrugged. "It happens. — Kresley Cole

We're not gonna misread our mandate. — Mitch McConnell

There had been a local with them, to witness the veracity of the night's work. In the aftermath, as he stood in the doorway and stared down at the three corpses, he'd lifted his head and met Crokus's eyes. Whatever he saw in them had drained the blood from the man's face.
By morning Crokus had acquired a new name. Cutter.
At first he had rejected it. The local had misread all that had been revealed behind the Daru's eyes that night. Nothing fierce. The barrier of shock, fast crumbling to self-condemnation. Murdering killers was still murder, the act like the closing of shackles between them all, joining a line of infinite length, one killer to the next, a procession from which there was no escape. — Steven Erikson

For a man who was to exhibit such acute political sharpness later in his career, Napoleon completely misread the revolution's opening stages. 'I repeat what I have said to you,' he wrote to Joseph on July 22, a week after the fall of the Bastille, 'calm will return. In a month, there will no longer be a question of anything. So, if you send me 300 livres [7,500 francs] I will go to Paris to terminate our business. — Andrew Roberts

You know what I'm thinking?' Maggie said. I had no idea. 'Nope,' David replied. Apparently David didn't know either. Maggie turned to me with pleading eyes.'Our babysitter has the flu.' 'I'm sorry to hear that,' I replied. Dead silence. I honestly had no idea what Maggie was getting at, so I misread the silence. 'It's not serious, I hope,' I said sympathetically. — Lisa Lutz

There was a danger that skeptics and opponents would misread those likelihood ratio tests as rejections of an entire class of models, which of course they were not. — Thomas J. Sargent

Well, biology today as I see it has an amiable look - quite different from the 19th-century view that the whole arrangement of nature is hostile, 'red in tooth and claw.' That came about because people misread Darwin's 'survival of the fittest.' — Lewis Thomas

Never underestimate the ability of political leaders to misread history on a monumental scale. The invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan have both served to hasten western decline: they have both failed to achieve their objectives and in the process demonstrated an underlying western impotence. — Martin Jacques

She grabbed his shirt and tore it open, buttons popping off and flying everywhere. She insinuated a knee between his thighs, meaning to apply some provocative friction to his private parts while she undid his pants. But he misread her intention. 'Oh, no, you don't, — Emma Darcy

For me her image, the triptych, became a study of the weight the black male figure carries, given the fact that they are targeted by the police, and are constantly in danger of being misread in public spaces. — Claudia Rankine

Our questions have been wrongly put, because they haven't been about the kingdom. They haven't been about God's sovereign, saving rule coming on earth as in heaven. Instead, our questions have been about a "salvation" that rescues people from the world, instead of for the world. "Going to heaven" has been the object (ever since the Middle Ages at least, in the Western church); "sin" is what stops us from getting there; so the cross must deal with sin, so that we can leave this world and go to the much better one in the sky, or in "eternity," or wherever. But this is simply untrue to the story the gospels are telling - which, again, explains why we've all misread these wonderful texts. Whatever the cross achieves must be articulated, if we are to take the four gospels seriously, within the context of the kingdom-bringing victory. — N. T. Wright

Experts must read the patterns and judge their usefulness as evidence. Under any of numerous pressures, an expert may wish to misread a pattern or even to alter it. Americans had a touching trust in "experts". — Dean Koontz

You know how there are words that never really - they are never really quite right. You can't quite trust them. Use them. You know. Without pause.'

'There are words I stare at,' Zach says. 'Strange. Every time. Misled, that's one. I see mizzled. And unshed. I read unched.'

'Me too! But that's a different thing - except, now you mention it, it's odd about unshed, that it's only for tears. Mostly. Hardly ever blood, for instance, you don't see unshed blood. Unched. Not really.'

'Not in my case anyway. Mine sheds all over the joint! I'm a bleeder all right. — Emma Richler

Books, by their very nature and variety, help us grow in empathy for others, in tolerance and awareness. But they should increase our skepticism as well as our humanity, for all good readers know how easy it is to misread. What counts is to stay receptive and open, to reserve judgment and try to foresee consequences, to avoid the facile conclusion and be ready to change one's mind. — Michael Dirda

Our efforts cannot and should not substitute for just public policies and effective programs to meet the needs of the hungry ... Money, food, and time donated to Catholic charities should not be misread as a sign for success for volunteerism, but rather a desperate attempt to feed the hungry people when others have abandoned their responsibility. — John Ricard

Adam Smith is misread as being amoral precisely because people don't read his first book, because they don't read 'The Theory of Moral Sentiments.' — P. J. O'Rourke

This is a problem, how can we have a body of knowledge and understanding and resist the temptation to misread the interest of the people because we're looking for an opportunity to unload this great load of gold that we have stored up? — Myles Horton

Signs must be read with caution. The history of Christendom is replete with instances of people who misread the signs. — Sheldon Vanauken

We misread the Fifth Amendment [of Constitution] and have been misreading it for the past three decades. — Joe Biden

Mythology, in other words, is psychology misread as biography, history, and cosmology. — Joseph Campbell

Is any novelist going to recognize the moment when he or she has nothing more to say? It is a brave thing to admit. And since as a professional writer you are full of anxiety anyway, you could easily misread the signs. — Julian Barnes

Silence is a text easy to misread. — A.A. Attanasio

I misread the romantic tension, Didn't I? — Marissa Meyer

Muhammad says, 'Love of one's country is a part of the faith.' But don't take that literally! Your real 'country' is where you're heading, not where you are. Don't misread that hadith. — Rumi

physicians often misread nature's warning signals. — Lawrence Schlachter

I replayed our last kiss in my mind, clinging to it like a life vest in a raging sea. Had I imagined his feelings for me, misread his intentions? What if everything he'd said was just a ploy, a scheme to get me to Tir Na Nog and the queen?
No, I couldn't believe that. The emotion on his face that night was real. I had to believe that he cared, I had to believe in him, or I would go crazy. — Julie Kagawa

In this game, you have to think about making plays, you can't worry about making mistakes. At times, a guy will get thrown out, but in the bigger scheme, the bases we're going to take will far outweigh that occasional misread. And it depends on what you call a mistake. If the outfielder puts the ball right on the money, he's out by a quarter-step and it's a bang-bang play, that's not a mistake. That's baseball. If you're out by four or five steps, it's ugly, it's a misread, but in the big picture, that aggressiveness is going to help us more than the occasional blunder will hurt. — Mike Scioscia

Because you were wearing a badge, customers assumed you were an oracle.
'What aisle is the desiccated coconut'
'How long do you cook a butternut squash?'
'What would you have with a pan fried red mullet?'
'Where can I find the holy grail?' Enough already! Some people obviously misread the 'Here to help' as 'Hello I'm your bitch! — Alan Carr

Item, I've read that there's not a single virgin to be found in your country," said the statesman.
"Where might you have read this?" asked the Professor Antiquitatum.
"The good auctor Blefken says this."
"I wonder if the good auctor might not have misread his sources," said Arnaeus. "The best auctores tell us that Icelandic girls remain chaste virgins up until they've had their seventh child, Your Benevolence. — Halldor Laxness

Will seeing me be a problem?"
While there's this overwhelming voice screaming yes in the back of my mind, there's a smile twisting on my face and I bring my hands together in front of me, feeling suddenly shy. Did he just say ... ? "So we're seeing each other?"
Isaiah touches an earring. "Yeah. I guess we are."
My head bobs back and forth because I so need more. "Like more than friends?"
"We can be friends if you want. But ... "
"But what?" My stomach begins to plummet. Did I misread all of this?
His gray eyes bore into mine with an intensity I've never seen from anyone before. "But I want more."
"More?" I whisper.
"I want to kiss you again. — Katie McGarry

When your mind is simply trapped by the image out there so that you never make the reference to yourself, you have misread the image. — Joseph Campbell

With Derrida, you can hardly misread him, because he's so obscure. Every time you say, "He says so and so," he always says, "You misunderstood me." But if you try to figure out the correct interpretation, then that's not so easy. I once said this to Michel Foucault, who was more hostile to Derrida even than I am, and Foucault said that Derrida practiced the method of obscurantisme terroriste (terrorism of obscurantism). We were speaking French. And I said, "What the hell do you mean by that?" And he said, "He writes so obscurely you can't tell what he's saying, that's the obscurantism part, and then when you criticize him, he can always say, 'You didn't understand me; you're an idiot.' That's the terrorism part." And I like that. So I wrote an article about Derrida. I asked Michel if it was OK if I quoted that passage, and he said yes. — John Rogers Searle

Obama ran as sane and decent, as though we were electing a mood, and not necessarily a set of policies. Unfortunately, Obama has governed the same way - and misread the mood, which is all there is, really, because being crazy and stupid is all we're really good at politically any more. — Charlie Pierce

The dreamers, those who misread the actual state of affairs and act upon their emotions, are often the source of the greatest mistakes in history - the wars that are not thought out, the disasters that are not foreseen — Robert Greene

I suppose I should be happy to be misread; better be that than some of the other things I have become. — Aimee Mann

Whitney misread my silent horror. "I'm excited, too! And don't worry, I snagged your friend Ella Francis as well. We can all hang together." Emphasized in that clueless way adults speak when trying to sound hip. — Kathy Reichs

We can fly!
"We can become butterflies!
"There's nothing at the top
and it doesn't matter!"
As he heard his own
message he realized how
he had misread the instinct
to get high.
To get to the "top" he
must fly, not climb. — Trina Paulus

Aha! She hadn't misread anything. A man who hinted at discussing lingerie definitely had his flirt mode engaged. Ella happened to own a leopard-print bra and panty set. But she couldn't admit it to him. — Anonymous

I have to blame myself for not finding any way of reaching him, but I can't feel that either Ruth or I had anything much to do with his corruption.
His personal motives were freedom and pleasure, and he misread them both. — Wallace Stegner

There is no surer way to misread any document than to read it literally. — Learned Hand

She's one you *really* care about, isn't she?"
Eliot shook his head. "How can you read other people so well, and completely misread me?"
Frowning, Sophie asked, "What do you mean?"
Looking right into her eyes, Eliot said, "I care about *all* of them. — Keith R.A. DeCandido

To be cheerful when others are in despair, to keep the faith when others falter, to be true even when we feel forsaken - all of these are deeply desired outcomes during the deliberate, divine tutorials which God gives to us - because He loves us. These learning experiences must not be misread as divine indifference. Instead, such tutorials are a part of the divine unfolding. — Neal A. Maxwell

He felt that he was still groping in the dark; he had chosen his path but kept looking back, wondering whether he had misread the signs, whether he should not have taken the other way. — J.K. Rowling

Even though I think writers can sometimes thrive from being misread. It can give them something to push off of. — Matthew Specktor

No one was in better position than I to know how easily shyness gets misread for arrogance or coldness or indifference. — Josh Lanyon

The adult must seem to mislead the child, and the Master the dog. They misread the signs. Their ignorance and their wishes twist everything. You are so sure you know what the promise promised! And the danger is that when what He means by 'wind' appears you will ignore it because it is not what you thought it would be - as He Himself was rejected because He was not like the Messiah the Jews had in mind. — Sheldon Vanauken

The 'Chronicles of Narnia' have been favourites of mine since my childhood when I misread 'Aslan' as 'Alsatian' and was struck by the genius of naming a lion after a dog! — Chris Riddell

That being said, some of my favorite poets are extremely funny. The aforementioned Matt Rohrer, for instance. Mary Ruefle. James Tate might be the best example of someone who is systematically misread because he can be hilarious. In his poems, as in all great funny poems, the humor is one very appealing version of the surprise and associative movement that is at the heart of all poetry. — Matthew Zapruder

I think it's very important for the American president to mean what he says. That's why I understand that the enemy could misread what I say. That's why I try to be as clearly as I can. — George W. Bush

As we've mentioned already, it is fairly easy to misread body language. — Leroy Jackson

When the Imecas hit 240, a Phase 1 emergency kicked in and schools and gas stations and some factories were closed. Phase 2 - 300 Imecas - closed all factories and forced drivers to leave their cars at home. The trouble was that the monitoring stations were mounted so high up, they misread levels down on the ground. Actual levels were closer to 500 Imecas, — John Ross

Girls are taught a lot of stuff growing up. If a guy punches you he likes you. Never try to trim your own bangs and someday you will meet a wonderful guy and get your very own happy ending. Every movie we see, Every story we're told implores us to wait for it, the third act twist, the unexpected declaration of love, the exception to the rule. But sometimes we're so focused on finding our happy ending we don't learn how to read the signs. How to tell from the ones who want us and the ones who don't, the ones who will stay and the ones who will leave. And maybe a happy ending doesn't include a guy, maybe ... it's you, on your own, picking up the pieces and starting over, freeing yourself up for something better in the future. Maybe the happy ending is ... just ... moving on. Or maybe the happy ending is this, knowing after all the unreturned phone calls, broken-hearts, through the blunders and misread signals, through all the pain and embarrassment you never gave up hope. — Greg Behrendt

In my third husband I had discovered a blissfully laid-back type who thought it nothing less than hilarious when I misread the map on the way to Wales, so it took us an extra three hours, or when I was sick in a plastic carrier bag during much of the drive back from Devon - a bag that turned out to have a hole in it. — Julie Burchill

I was anticipating that some readers might misread [ the book]ROOM itself as a hymn to homeschooling. — Emma Donoghue