Top 1200 Old English Quotes & Sayings - Page 5

Other people, including me, have written books with main characters who were old and rich. Or old and brilliant. Old sages, old wizards, old rich people.

The leading princes are the most servile tools of English despotism. . . . The native princes are the stronghold of the present abominable English system.

In the first English class I attended, Prof. E. H. Elliot, addressing me, asked if I really belonged to the Junior B. A. class, and I had to answer him in the affirmative. He then proceeded to inquire how old I was.

People think of black English as ungrammatical, but it bears the same relationship to standard English as contemporary Hebrew does to ancient Hebrew.

I write in English first, and then I translate to Spanish. I've always felt more comfortable with the English side of things first.

As far as getting work, no one thought I spoke English. It was absolutely ridiculous. I'd show up at a meeting and they'd be like, 'Oh my God, you speak English! That's so cool.' They didn't really know what to do with me.

English is a forgiving language. It's not like Classical Arabic and it's not like French. You can speak broken English and be expressive and no one will hold it against you.

I moved to New York when I was eight years old, in 1978. I grew up in Manhattan. I couldn't speak any English, and I had dyslexia, so it took me many years before I could read.

Woman at Point Zero I wrote during the '70s in Arabic. It came in English in '82. So, almost ten years' difference between the Arabic and the English.

When I speak in English, my expressions become different. My attitude, too. I'm not sure why, but there really is a difference. My hands move differently when I speak English.

The English tradition offers the great tapestry novel, where you have the emotional aspect of a detective's personal life, the circumstances of the crime and, most important, the atmosphere of the English countryside that functions as another character.

"Stupid English." "English isn't stupid," I say. "Well, my English teacher is." He makes a face. "Mr. Franklin assigned an essay about our favorite subject, and I wanted to write about lunch, but he won't let me." "Why not?" "He says lunch isn't a subject." I glance at him. "It isn't." "Well," Jacob says, "it's not a predicate, either. Shouldn't he know that?"

I had found English audiences highly satisfactory. They are the best listeners in the world. Perhaps the music-lovers of some of our larger cities equal the English, but I do not believe they can be surpassed in that respect.

It is possible to eat English piecrust, whatever you may think at first. The English eat it, and when they stand up and walk away, they are hardly bent over at all.

I've never lived in an English-speaking country, ever, but I lived in Austria. So, my second language is German. And when I went to school, I had a lot of classes in English.

[It was] the poverty caused by the bad influence of the English bankers on the Parliament which has caused in the colonies hatred of the English and . . . the Revolutionary War.

English, for me, is an acquired language. I started with English at the age of 10. At the time, it was my third language.

We, the English educated Indians, often unconsciously make the terrible mistake of thinking that the microscopic minority of the English-speaking Indians is the whole of India.

I'm keen on making English language movies. English is still the global language and we can't change that.

My mother was a children's librarian, and I was raised on lots of English children's literature. It gave me this weird idea that I was English.

Honestly, I can't understand English poetry. Because I am not an English speaker, when I read it I never know how to read it in the right rhythm.

So I went to English school, secondary English school, so forget going to Mecca for my religious education.

Tis true among fields and woods I sing, Aloof from cities--that my poor strains Were born, like the simple flowers you bring, In English meadows and English lanes.

For decades, as literary editor, I have followed the growth of our creative writing in English. In my Solidaridad Bookshop, half of my stock consists of Filipino books written in English and in the native languages.

As Governor of my country, I have been an enemy to its enemies; I have slain the English; I have mortally opposed the English King; I have stormed and taken the towns and castles which he unjustly claimed as his own.

Home. It's being new and old all rolled into one. Measuring your new against old friends, old ways, old places, Knowing that as long as the old survives, you can keep changing as much as you want without the nightmare of waking up to a total stranger.

One thing about Indonesians is that a lot of them, even if they don't understand English, have absolutely no problem memorizing English songs. Even my dad.

I grew up listening to people speaking broken English. I probably picked that up. And I probably speak English almost as a second language.

I've got two old Volvos, two old Subarus, and an old Ford Ranger. If you've got an old car, you've gotta have at least several old cars, 'cause one's always gonna be in the garage.

So I went to English school, secondary English school, so forget going to Mecca for my religious education

I think my films are very English. That certain emotional distance, interest in the world, interest in irony. These are all deeply English propositions.

Somebody said to me that I speak English almost like somebody for whom English is not their first language.

It was always said that the big distinction between the French and the English is that the English are intelligent and the French are intellectual.

The American language differs from the English in that it seeks the top of expression while English seeks its lowly valleys.

Sitting in an English Garden waiting for the sun If the sun don't come You get a tan from standing in the English rain.

When I came to Hollywood, I spoke no English - except nobody bullied me. Every day, I had nothing to do except training in English, to keep talking.

Britain is not homogenous; it was never a society without conflict. The English fought tooth and nail over everything we know of as English political virtues - rule of law, free speech, the franchise.

This noble word [women], spirit-stirring as it passes over English ears, is in America banished, and 'ladies' and 'females' substituted: the one to English taste mawkish and vulgar; the other indistinctive and gross.

'English Rose' - what does that actually mean? That I am pale? That I am English, maybe? They are going to say that about any actress from this country!

There is no myth relative to the manners and customs of the English that in my experience is more tenaciously held by the ordinary Frenchman than that the sale of a wife in the market-place is an habitual and an accepted fact in English life.

I'm from the island of St. Lucia in the Caribbean in the Lesser Antilles, the lower part of the archipelago, which is a bilingual island - French, Creole, and English - but my education is in English.

I'm basically a writer of ideas, and the English aren't interested in ideas. The English, I'm afraid, are totally brainless.

I have never considered myself English Both my husband and my son say I don't understand English humour, and they don't always understand what I think is funny, or when I'm being ironic.

One of the reasons we require immigrants to learn English before they naturalize is that a person who cannot understand English will not be able to participate in the political community in any but the most limited capacity.

As Governor of my country, I have been an enemy to its enemies; I have slain the English; I have mortally opposed the English King; I have stormed and taken the towns and castles which he unjustly claimed as his own.

Everyone tells me I have a funny accent. It's because I copy people. I learned English at school but have best friends who are French, Australian, English and American; a very weird mix.

My plea is for banishing the English language as a cultural usurper, as we successfully banished the political rule of the English usurper.

The Americans all love 'The Holy Grail', and the English all love 'Life Of Brian', and I'm afraid on this one, I side with the English.

Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble.

I was brought up by the English side of my family, who are very repressed and working class. Absolutely lovely, but very English.

A word about 'plain English.' The phrase certainly shouldn't connote drab and dreary language. Actually, plain English is typically quite interesting to read. It's robust and direct-the opposite of gaudy, pretentious language. You achieve plain English when you use the simplest, most straightforward way of expressing an idea. You can still choose interesting words. But you'll avoid fancy ones that have everyday replacements meaning precisely the same thing.

Growing up was very interesting for me. If you were Haitian, people just automatically assumed that English was a second language. So they had a special class for my brother and I, but we spoke proper English.

I'm English. I've never said the opposite. I'm 100 per cent English. In Portugal it happens that a lot of Brazilians play for Portugal and they're not Portuguese.

Radio in England is nonexistent. It's very bad English use of a media system, typically English use.

YOU have no room to laugh, that's all. I'm not doing any worse with Boovish than you did with English.' Get off of the car,' J.Lo huffed. 'I am an English superstar.' Uh-uh. There's no comparison. 'Gratuity' in written Boovish has seventeen different bubbles that all have to be the right size and in the right place. 'J.Lo' in written English only has three letters, and you still spelled it 'M-smiley face-pound sign.

The larger an English industry was, the more likely it was to go bankrupt, because the English were not naturally corporate people; they disliked working for others and they seemed to resent taking orders. On the whole, directors were treated absurdly well, and workers badly, and most industries were weakened by class suspicion and false economies and cynicism. But the same qualities that made English people seem stubborn and secretive made them, face to face, reliable and true to their word. I thought: The English do small things well and big things badly.

When I'm writing poetry, 99.9% of my writing begins in English. I spent most of my life in English, although I am bilingual.

Most of us would be upset if we were accused of being "silly." But the word "silly" comes from the old English word "selig," and its literal definition is "to be blessed, happy, healthy and prosperous."

Before the Roman came to Rye or out to severn strode, / The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.

The fact that I am writing to you in English already falsifies what I wanted to tell you. My subject: how to explain to you that I don't belong to English though I belong nowhere else