Tag: Jack Vance

Quote of the Week: You and Your Native Tongue


200px-Languages_of_pao"Each language is a special tool, with a particular capability.  It is more than a means of communication, it is a system of thought…  Think of a language as the contour of a watershed, stopping flow in certain directions, channeling it into others.  Language controls the mechanism of your mind.  When people speak different languages, their minds work differently and they act differently…  The question arises: does the language provoke or merely reflect…  Which came first: the language or the conduct?"

     Jack Vance, The Languages of Pao, 1958

The Frustrated CFO's comment: Maybe not the most mind-blowing science-fiction opus of mid-20s century, this short novel by the 14th Grand Master of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America is, nevertheless, full of fascinating concepts.  Those who ever wondered about the unmistakable passion of Italian, so perfect for melodramatic singing and kitchen fighting; or thought that French sounds too snooty even when spoken by hard-core street thugs, yet so sexy when whispered in one's ear; or heard dogs barking and whips lashing around people speaking German – will find the idea of controlling people through languages especially engaging.   

Quote of the Week: The Nesting Doll of Human Conglomeration


“Any collocation of persons, no matter how numerous, how scant, how even their homogeneity, how firmly they profess common doctrine, will presently reveal themselves to consist of smaller groups espousing variant versions of the common creed; and these sub-groups will manifest sub-sub-groups, and so to the final limit of the single individual, and even in this single person conflicting tendencies will express themselves.”

        Attributed to the imaginary author Adam Ostwald of a hypothetical tractate “Human Society”