Archive: March 2026

What is the difference between an aphorism and an epigram? Epigrams usually rhyme, are often funny and cynical, and are often intended to castigate or criticize a rival. When they are also philosophical, they are aphorisms. Martial (Geary’s Guide, pp. 293-294) is the Western author most closely associated with the form, though people like Dorothy Parker, Ogden Nash, and Alexander Pope also wrote what could be considered epigrams. Jim Adams writes epigrams that meet the aphoristic criterion. His use of the form, he writes, reflects his “‘essentialist’ disposition, one that pushes me to do my best to get to the core of things, and to respond to what I find as simply and concisely as possible.” His website has more about his epigrams and paintings, which he calls “visual epigrams,” as well as his book, Epigrams.

Different Strokes

 

Some

Curse

The

Distractions

That

Keep

Them

From

Living their lives,

Others

Can’t

Live

Without

Them.

Tautologies

 

Taking

The

Lord’s

Name

Is

Always

In

Vain.

Generation

 

No

Single

Little

Thing

Changes

Things

More than

An

Offspring.

Parallels

 

Somehow,

Both love

And

Democracy

Are

Particularly

Vulnerable

To the

Contempt

Of

Familiarity.

GDP

 

A

Truly

Developed

Country

Would

Know

It

Need

No

Longer

Grow.

Recipe

 

Tolerance’s

Main

Ingredient

Is

Expedience.

Richard Greene started writing aphorisms after noticing that a line in one of his poems read like an aphorism — a self-contained gnomic utterance. (For a consideration of poems as aphorisms, see my discussion with Neil Denny of Emily Dickinson, Dorothy Parker, and Samuel Hoffenstein on the Little Atoms (24:15-26-35) podcast.) “Aphorisms appealed to me because, like poetry, slogans and rhetoric, [they have] an emotional resonance that other prose has more rarely or in an attenuated form … Aphorisms frequently exaggerate, stating as universal truths that are only conditional … That doesn’t detract from their wisdom. Hyperbole contributes to their rhetorical impact.” Richard self-published his aphorisms as A Curmudgeon’s Guide to Post-Modern Times: Aphorisms. Herewith a selection of Richard Greene’s curmudgeonly guidance…

The truly strong are those who aren’t driven by the need to prove their strength.

Mankind is an endangering species.

The main challenge to human welfare is human nature.

I don’t need to be reborn. I got it right the first time.

Sooner or later the cutting edge becomes dull.

Poetry is the art of the implied.

In poetry it’s the difference between synonyms that counts.

The video of my appearance at the Charleston (SC) Literary Festival back in November was recently posted, which gives me an opportunity to once again thank Diana Reich, Sarah Moriarty, and the whole Charleston Literary Festival team, especially the crew at the splendid Dock Street Theatre who got the lights just right for juggling (even though I dropped the ball) and Ladybird Books for selling the books. And thanks to splendid audience who turned out to juggle words, ideas, and balls.

There was a blank sheet selected from the globe, and the subject was: Soccer, which allowed me to share once again the timeless wisdom of Johan Cruijff, a Dutch soccer star whose distinctive sayings have been given their own name: Cruijffisms.

Without the ball, you can’t win.

Before I make a mistake, I do not make that mistake.

Every disadvantage gots its advantage.

Cruijff is like a Dutch Yogi Berra, an inadvertent aphorist whose philosophical non sequiturs are spontaneous rather than deliberate. And the choice of Soccer as a subject gave me the chance to share some of my favorite Yogi anecdote: Once in an Italian restaurant, Berra was asked if he wanted his pizza cut into four or eight slices. “Four,” he said. “I don’t think I can eat eight.”