Modifiers Quotes & Sayings

Because a lake is conceived as having only two primary dimensions, you can't swim inside the lake, though that would seem to make geometric sense. Lederer asks why we say that something can be underwater or underground even though it's surrounded by, not beneath, the water or the ground. It's because water and ground are conceived as 2-D surfaces, not 3-D volumes, geologically improbable though that is. The dimensionality of an object is also the aspect of its geometry that modifiers "see" when they combine with it in a phrase. A big CD, for example, has to have an above-average diameter, not an above-standard thickness (that could only be a thick CD), and a big lake has to be one with an unusually large area, regardless of its depth; it can't be a few yards wide and a mile deep. — Steven Pinker

I sutured split infinitives and hoisted dangling modifiers and wore out the seam of my best flannel skirt. — Amor Towles

The most painful thing for me is to be misunderstood. — Matthew Collings

The Da Vinci Code may well be the only novel ever written that begins with the word 'renowned' ... I think what enabled the first word to tip me off that I was about to spend a number of hours in the company of one of the worst prose stylists in the history of literature was this. Putting curriculum vitae details into complex modifiers on proper names or definite descriptions is what you do in journalistic stories about deaths; you just don't do it in describing an event in a narrative ... Why did I keep reading? Because London Heathrow is a long way from San Francisco International. — Geoffrey K. Pullum

It's sad, but a relief as well, to know that two things so closely bound together can separate with so little violence. — Julie Powell

While the days of parenting may seem so long, the years are so short. — Daniel J. Siegel

It's not entirely absurd to think that somewhere in the past of mankind someone, for the first time, did in his mind the equivalent of putting an adjective to a noun, and saw, not only a relationship, but this special relationship between two things of different kinds ... In sum, all the seemingly complicated kinds of modification in English are just ways of thinking and seeing how things go with each other or reflect each other. Modifiers in our language are not aids to understanding relationships; they are the ways to understand relationships. A mistake in this matter either comes from or causes a clouded mind. Usually it's both. — Richard Mitchell

A world without adjectives would still have the sun rising and setting, the flowers blooming, the trees bearing fruits, the birds singing, and the bees stinging. — A.A. Patawaran

Follow the ideal doing,
grind the beans just before brewing.
Use spring water,
for softened water,
makes a horror.
A parley perfect,
between the coffee,
and the milk,
with some,
brown sugar thick."
(Poem: An apology of a coffee lunatic, Book: Ginger and Honey) — Jasleen Kaur Gumber

I know the answer to the question now, by the way: why bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people. It came from my inner editor, the part of me that forces the wordy writer in me to dump ninety percent of all modifiers: Ask both questions again, minus the adjectives.
"Why do things happen to people?"
Just because. — Chris Crutcher

Choosing a partner is choosing a set of problems. There are no problem-free candidates. — Carol S. Dweck

Front-loaded modifiers can be useful in qualifying a sentence, in tying it to information mentioned earlier, or simply in avoiding the monotony of having one right-branching sentence after another. As long as the modifier is short, it poses no difficulty for the reader. But if it starts to get longer it can force a reader to entertain a complicated qualification before she has any idea what it is qualifying. — Steven Pinker

I spend my days kneeling in the muck of language, feeling around for gooey verbs, nouns, and modifiers that I can squash together to make a blob of a sentence that bears some likeness to reason and sense. — P. J. O'Rourke

Lussurioso: "Welcome, be not far off, we must be better acquainted. Push, be bold with us, thy hand!"
Vindice: "With all my heart, i'faith. How dost, sweet musk-cat?
When shall we lie together?"
Lussurioso: (aside) "Wondrous knave!
Gather him into boldness? 'Sfoot, the slave's
Already as familiar as an ague,
And shakes me at his pleasure!
Friend, I can
Forget myself in private, but elsewhere,
I pray do you remember be."
Vindice: "Oh, very well, sir.
I conster myself saucy."
Lussurioso: "What hast been? What profession?"
Vindice: "A bone-setter."
Lussurioso: "A bone-setter!"
Vindice: "A bawd, my lord, one that sets bones together."
Lussurioso: (aside) "Notable bluntness! — Thomas Middleton

Oh, that was smooth. I'm as subtle as a fart. — Barry Lyga

Feed a squirrel and he'll leave you alone every day. — Brian Spellman

Death to all modifiers, he declared one day, and out of every letter that passed through his hands went every adverb and every adjective. — Joseph Heller

Traditional methods of sales prospecting are grossly inefficient. — Jill Konrath

My palette contains a warm and cool of each primary, plus four modifiers: Yellow Ochre, Burnt Sienna, Blue-Violet and Phthalo Yellow-Green just mix as I go for each painting. — Matt Smith

When other people are grieving, the newspaperman turns efficient. — Stieg Larsson

The dangerous pileup of modifiers is a hallmark of Joel's rhetorical style. — Michael Pollan