Tracing Quotations
Oscar Wilde? Robert Ross? Frank Harris? Hesketh Pearson? Josiah Flynt? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: According to legend, Oscar Wilde was resting with his eyes closed on his deathbed when two physicians began discussing the necessity of a very expensive operation to extend his life. Wilde opened his eyes and said: I suppose that I shall …
Continue reading “I Am Dying, As I Have Lived, Beyond My Means”
Friedrich Nietzsche? Josh Billings? Thomas Common? Alexander Tille? Walter Kaufmann? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: A popular humorist or a famous philosopher said something like the following: It is better to know nothing than to half-know many topics. Would you please help me to find the correct statement of this adage and the name of its …
Continue reading “Better Know Nothing Than Half-Know Many Things”
Oscar Wilde? Claire de Pratz? Léon Guillot de Saix? Lady Gregory? William Butler Yeats? Hesketh Pearson? Philippe Jullian? Violet Wyndham? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: Near the end of Oscar Wilde’s life he was debt-ridden and ill. His shabby accommodations in Paris did not meet his aesthetic standards. According to legend he said something similar to …
Continue reading “This Wallpaper Is Killing Me; One of Us Must Go”
William Shakespeare? Henry van Dyke? Alice Morse Earle? Katrina Trask? H. L. Mencken? Lady Jane Fellowes? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The following lines have been credited to the famous English playwright and poet William Shakespeare: Time is very slow for those who wait Very fast for those who are scared Very long for those who …
Continue reading “Time Is Too Slow for Those Who Wait; Too Swift for Those Who Fear”
Will Rogers? Robert Muldoon? Herbert L. Carver? Anthony S. Rogers? Harry Woodhead? Lynn T. White? Robert Ruark? Dewey F. Bartlett? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: There is a humorous remark about migration that initially seems a bit paradoxical. Here are two versions: When the Okies left Oklahoma and moved to California, they raised the average intelligence …
Continue reading “When the Okies Migrated To California, It Raised the I.Q. in Both States”
Ernest Hemingway? Mandy Hale? The Single Woman? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: I recently encountered a quotation using evocative language about the rain stopping and the night ending. The quotation emphasized that one should feel hopeful. Oddly, the famous author Ernest Hemingway received credit for the remark, but I do not think it sounds anything like …
John von Neumann? R.L. Duffus? Albert Wohlstetter? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The remarkable recent advances in the field of artificial intelligence have produced feelings of excitement and foreboding. Power, hope, and danger are intertwined with technological discoveries. A famous scientist emphasized the inevitability of challenges: For progress there is no cure. Would you please explore …
John S. White? F. J. Finch? Glenn Franc? E. Stanley Jones? Orval Hobart Mowrer? Harry Emerson Fosdick? J. P. Allen? Zig Ziglar? Bruce Norman? Susan Glaser? John C. Maxwell? Jerry Sternin? Millard Fuller? Dear Quote Investigator: In self-help and motivation books I’ve encountered the following saying: It is easier to act yourself into a new …
James Baldwin? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The prominent writer James Baldwin crafted a brilliant two part statement about purposeful literature: Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced. The word “everything” was converted to its antonym “nothing” in the second part. Also, the key words “faced” …
Winston Churchill? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: Winston Churchill once spoke about the “undying genius” of his fellow citizens while exhorting them to make a “supreme effort” to maintain a successful country. Would you please help me to find a citation? Quote Investigator: In 1952 Winston Churchill visited his alma mater, the Harrow School in London, …
Continue reading “A Place and Station To Which Our Tradition and Undying Genius Entitle Us”