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June 20, 2003
Suffering From Aphasia
Sometimes I do think langauge is like fire; it can be both our master and our slave.
Right now, it's my tyrant, and I'm crushing under the weight of it.
I've thus been rendered rather speechless.
And since I can't speak, I will let others do the talking.
In the beginning was the Word, and since then there's been a quote.
-- Thomas McEvilley, 1984
Running up against the limits of language? Language is, after all, not a cage.
--Ludwig Wittgenstein, 17. December 1939.
We lack words, and we have too many of them.
-- Susan Sontag, The Aesthetics of Silence, 1967.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said,
in rather a scornful tone, "it means exactly
what I chose it to mean--neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can
make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty,
"which is to be master--that's all."
-- Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass
A monk asked Fuketsu, "How can one express truth
without speaking or remaining silent?"
Fuketsu replied, "I always remind myself of spring in south China.
Birds sing in the midst of countless varieties of fragrant flowers."
-- Mu-Mon-Koan, no. 24
Posted by lainey at June 20, 2003 10:30 AM