Safire, William (1929-...), is a popular American journalist and novelist. He is best known for his weekly column on language usage in The New York Times Magazine. The column, called "On Language," explores the origins of words and analyzes proper and incorrect language usage. From 1973 to 2005, Safire regularly wrote a political column for The New York Times that typically expressed his conservative political views. He won the 1978 Pulitzer Prize for commentary.