Mark Twain Quotes

Accuracy of language is one of the bulwarks of truth.

Mark Twain said, 'The right word is to the nearly right word as lightning is to the lightning bug.' Fill your book with lightning.

Don't write so that you can be understood, write so that you can't be misunderstood.

I enjoy finding the right word and giving each its full measure, its full space in a sentence.

The single most important lesson of effective communication is this: Focus on clarity. Concentrate on precisions. Don’t worry about constructing beautiful sentences. Beauty comes from meaning, not language. Accuracy is the most effective style of all.

Well, one thing I'm really interested in, when I'm writing, is being accurate.

It's important to be precise about words, because of the thought value of them-they frame and shape so much of the way we understand things.

People know accuracy when they read it; they can feel it.

The right word fitly spoken is a precious rarity.

I consider looseness with words no less of a defect than looseness of the bowels.

Brevity and conciseness are the parents of correction.

I like playing around with the words; I love it when I feel like I've picked the exact right word to describe whatever it is I'm trying to describe.

Because of the way my words get scrutinized, I have to use a level of precision so people don't accuse me of misleading them.

The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.

Ambiguity is very interesting in writing; it's not very interesting in science.

I always craft my words to the point where I think and hope they're perfect before I ever begin sketching.

Some people are always critical of vague statements. I tend rather to be critical of precise statements; they are the only ones which can correctly be labeled 'wrong'.

Language is a tool adequate to provide any degree of precision relevant to a particular situation.

Accuracy is, in every case, advantageous to beauty, and just reasoning to delicate sentiment. In vain would we exalt the one by depreciating the other.

Exactitude is not truth.

I think the close work I do as a translator pays off in my writing - I'm always searching for multiple ways to say things.

When I write something, every word of it is meant. I can't say it enough.

Before the scene, before the paragraph, even before the sentence, comes the word. Individual words and phrases are the building blocks of fiction, the genes that generate everything else. Use the right words, and your fiction can blossom. The French have a phrase for it - le mot juste - the exact right word in the exact right position.

I love the right words. I think economy and precision of language are important.

I often want things to make definite statements. If I order onions sliced thinly on my hamburger, I don't want them to come out sort of medium. But that doesn't mean it's a reasonable desire, in all things.