Points to Ponder

WE HAVE BECOME a nation of promiscuous punctuators … When a single point denotes basic human warmth, more points are needed to convey enthusiasm (!!), even more to convey excitement (!!!), and more still to convey giddiness (Prime Rib Saturday!!!!).

MEGAN GARBER, columnist, in the Atlantic

HISTORIES OF ABOLITION, the civil rights movement, even environmentalism, don’t begin with people who are powerful, realistic, or even normal. They begin with people who don’t know better and who find the world they are born into intolerable.

JEDEDIAH PURDY, law professor, in the Daily Beast

I THINK ANIMALS are better muses than human beings – they’ll never fall out of fashion.

KARL LAGERFELD, fashion designer, in Harper’s Bazaar

IF EVERYONE followed through on their resolutions, the consequences for humanity would be dire: the fast-food industry would collapse, the gym would become unbearably crowded, and lifestyle magazines would have nothing left to say.

AMANDA FOREMAN, historian, in the Wall Street Journal

MY DAUGHTER made an amazing jump in the pool the other day. I said, “You’re so brave.” She said, “No, I was scared.” I said, “That’s why you’re brave. If you weren’t scared, you wouldn’t be brave at all. You’d just be dumb.”

MARY-LOUISE PARKER, actress, in Esquire

[E-MAIL IS] our last remnant of oldfashioned letter writing, a ritual most of us adore. E-mail’s as malleable, swift, and cheap as air.

JOAN FRANK, author, on zyzzyva.org