A Quote by Simone de Beauvoir

Sometimes speech is no more than a device for saying nothing - and a neater one than silence.

Simone de Beauvoir

Quote Topics

Device More Nothing Saying Saying No Saying Nothing Silence Sometimes Speech Than

Quote Author

Simone de Beauvoir
French - Writer
January 9, 1908 - April 14, 1986

Silence has sometimes a remarkable power of showing itself as the disembodied soul of feeling wandering without its carcase, and it is then more impressive than speech.

Thomas Hardy

Life in the country teaches one that the really stimulating things are the quiet, natural things, and the really wearisome things are the noisy, unnatural things. It is more exciting to stand still than to dance. Silence is more eloquent than speech. Water is more stimulating than wine. Fresh air is more intoxicating than cigarette smoke. Sunlight is more subtle than electric light. The scent of grass is more luxurious than the most expensive perfume. The slow, simple observations of the peasant are more wise than the most sparkling epigrams of the latest wit.

Beverley Nichols

Does it seem sometimes that you are always the one to break an embarrassing silence — and always by saying something more embarrassing than the silence?

Robert Breault

My poems are more my silence than my speech. Just as music is a kind of quiet. Sounds are needed only to unveil the various layers of silence.

Anna Kamienska

Silence is never-ending speech. Vocal speech obstructs the other speech of silence. In silence one is in intimate contact with the surroundings. Language is only a medium for communicating one's thoughts to another. Silence is ever speaking.

Ramana Maharshi

More have repented speech then silence. [More have repented speech than silence.]

George Herbert

You know, there's nothing more interesting than seeing a bunch of racists become confused and angry at a speech they're not quite certain what he's saying.

Janeane Garofalo

Curtailment of free speech is rationalized on grounds that a more compelling American tradition forbids criticism of the government when the nation is at war... Nothing can be more destructive of our fundamental democratic traditions than the vicious effort to silence dissenters.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

courage isn't simply a matter of leading charges: sometimes it consists in speaking up, sometimes in stoic silence, sometimes in forging ahead, sometimes in circumspection, and sometimes in nothing less than preserving our own humanity.

Elizabeth Samet

It's better to say nothing than spend 1,000 words or an hour speech saying nothing. Get to the point.

Richard Branson

Many things are better for silence than for speech: others are better for speech than for stationery.

Lord Acton

Well-timed silence hath more eloquence than speech.

Martin Farquhar Tupper

Silence often expresses 'more powerfully than speech the verdict and judgment of society.

Benjamin Disraeli

Saying that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about freedom of speech because you have nothing to say.

Jean-Michel Jarre

The mark of solitude is silence, as speech is the mark of community. Silence and speech have the same inner correspondence and difference as do solitude and community. One does not exist without the other. Right speech comes out of silence, and right silence comes out of speech.