Tracing Quotations
Jimmy Durante? Wilson Mizner? Walter Winchell? George Raft? Dear Quote Investigator: Sometimes clichés become clichés because they express important truths. I think this is an example: Be nice to those you meet on the way up because you will meet them on the way down Can you determine who first came up with this insightful …
Continue reading “Be Nice to People on Your Way Up. You’ll Meet Them On Your Way Down”
Gore Vidal? Lewis H. Lapham? Fictional? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: When I watch reality television shows today I can only conclude that some people will do anything to be on television. This fits the advice the famous author Gore Vidal apparently gave: Never turn down an opportunity to have sex or to be on television …
Continue reading “Never Miss a Chance to Have Sex or Appear On Television”
Mark Twain? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: I am interested in a fantastic quotation that I always thought was from the pen of Mark Twain: When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was …
Continue reading “When I Was a Boy of Fourteen, My Father Was So Ignorant”
Tony Curtis? Fictional? Dear Quote Investigator: Tony Curtis was a wonderful actor, and I was saddened when he passed away in 2010. For years I have wondered about a quotation that he supposedly said. The story goes that he was asked what it was like to kiss Marilyn Monroe and he said: Kissing Marilyn was …
Continue reading “Kissing Marilyn Monroe is Like Kissing Hitler”
Groucho Marx? Walter Winchell? George S. Kaufman? George Jean Nathan? Dear Quote Investigator: When a friend asked me my opinion of a terrible play that I saw recently I answered: I did not like it, but perhaps this judgment is unfair. I saw it under adverse conditions — the curtain was up. Eventually she coaxed …
Continue reading “Theatrical Review: I Saw It Under Adverse Conditions. The Curtain Was Up”
Mark Twain? Grant Allen? Dear Quote Investigator: I am still in school and that is probably why the following quote attributed to Mark Twain appeals to me so much: I have never let my schooling interfere with my education. Your blog posts about Twain quotations reveal that the information on the internet about what he …
Continue reading “Never Let Schooling Interfere With Your Education”
Evan Esar? Jan Harold Brunvand? Bennett Cerf? Dear Quote Investigator: I was speaking with a friend about all the misinformation and misattributions in the world of quotations, and he said that he was familiar with this phenomenon of unreliability because he enjoys reading about urban-legends. He also gave his own quotation on this theme which …
Wilson Mizner? Steven Wright? Wallace Notestein? Ralph Foss? Joseph Cummings Chase? Asa George Baker? Leslie Henson? Tom Lehrer? Bob Oliver? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Some of the websites I come across seem to produce their content by using cut and paste. They do not even bother to collect information from multiple sources. I am reminded …
Dorothy Parker? Punch Humor Magazine? Sally’s Sallies Comic Strip? Ann Landers? Dear Quote Investigator: Previously you discussed a quote of Dorothy Parker’s which was self-critical, but she also directed her barbs at others. Here is an example [LWO]: When a garrulous old battle-ax was praised as “outspoken,” Mrs. Parker raised an eyebrow to take dead …
Continue reading ““Our host certainly is outspoken.” “Outspoken by whom?””
Mark Twain? James Montgomery Flagg? William Dean Howells? Dear Quote Investigator: When I discovered your blog I knew just the right word to describe it: Quotesmanship. That word was used in the New York Times in 1980 to describe the desire to determine and use correct attributions for quotations [NYQM]. The author of the Quotesmanship …