Word: unspeakables
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...crisis was aggravated by 20th century history. In public life, totalitarianism has corrupted language by its tendency, as Steiner puts it, to "unspeak the actual past" while conjugating its verbs only in the "depersonalized present" and "Utopian future." In private life, Steiner claims, people have come to speak more and say less. He cites studies of urban phone calls that indicate "a drastic diminution and standardization of vocabulary and syntax." He observes that "quiet is becoming the prerogative of a sheltered elite or the cage of the desolate...
Observers have said that the "unspeak able hardships" undergone by Senator Borah will place Mr. Hoover deeply in his debt. If the Republicans should win, he would be the Senate's commanding figure and his commands would have to be listened to at the White House. When Sena tor Borah left Missouri it was to go to Washington to suggest that a special ses sion of Congress be promised for next spring to act on the farm problem, if necessary...
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