Truman Capote? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The authors of The Beat Generation were an influential disaffected group whose works jolted the culture of 1950s America. The spontaneous prose technique employed by the central figure Jack Kerouac in the composition of his 1957 novel “On the Road” was acclaimed and disparaged. The most trenchant criticism reportedly …
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History Is Just One Damn Thing after Another
Arnold J. Toynbee? Max Plowman? H. A. L. Fisher? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The famous historian Arnold J. Toynbee wrote a monumental 12-volume work titled “A Study of History” in which he delineated the trajectories of several major human civilizations. Surprisingly, a comically depreciatory definition of history is attributed to him. Here are two versions: …
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Lyricist Versus Composer: The Song “Ol’ Man River”
Oscar Hammerstein II? Dorothy Hammerstein? Leonard Lyons? Dear Quote Investigator: The division of credit between music composers and lyricists can be controversial. Some lyricists believe that their song writing skills are not given adequate respect. One vivid anecdote revealed the unhappiness of Dorothy Hammerstein who was the wife of the prominent Broadway song creator Oscar …
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Insanity Is Hereditary. You Can Get It from Your Children
Sam Levenson? Oscar Levant? W. C. Fields? Helen Gorn Sutin? Dave Berg? Ann Landers? Erma Bombeck? Grace Kelly? Dear Quote Investigator: Many parents concur with a very funny quip that reverses the traditional notion of inheritance: Insanity is hereditary. You get it from your kids. This joke has been attributed to the newspaper columnist Erma …
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People Who Like This Sort of Thing Will Find This the Sort of Thing They Like
Abraham Lincoln? Artemus Ward? George Bernard Shaw? Max Beerbohm? Muriel Spark? Dear Quote Investigator: A popular anecdote asserts that Abraham Lincoln was obliged to listen to a prolix lecture about spiritualism by an enthusiastic friend. After the discourse was complete, Lincoln’s opinion was sought, and he replied with a humorously redundant non-committal statement designed to …
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Youth Is Wasted on the Young
George Bernard Shaw? Oscar Wilde? Irvin Cobb? Michel de Montaigne? John Brunner? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: A very popular acerbic adage combines wisdom and wistfulness together with a modicum of jealousy: Youth is wasted on the young. These words have been attributed to two famous Irish wits: George Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde. Oddly, I …
Act One: Get Character Up a Tree. Act Two: Throw Rocks. Act Three: Get Character Down.
Vladimir Nabokov? Harry B. Smith? Augustus Thomas? George M. Cohan? George Abbott? Steven Spielberg? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Recently, I saw a fascinating quotation about writing that was attributed to the brilliant prose stylist Vladimir Nabokov: The writer’s job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, …
Life Is Just One Damn Thing After Another
Mark Twain? Lilian Bell? Elbert Hubbard? Frank Ward O’Malley? Bruce Calvert? H. L. Mencken? Charles Dickens? Edna St. Vincent Millay? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: The following statement of exasperation and resignation has been attributed to the luminary Mark Twain, the aphorist Elbert Hubbard, and the journalist Frank Ward O’Malley: Life is just one damn thing …
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That Works Very Well in Practice, But How Does It Work In Theory?
Heidelberg Professor? Chairman of an Irish Company? Claude T. Bissell? Sean MacReamoinn? Walter Heller? Garret FitzGerald? Ernest Hollings? Anonymous? Quote Investigator: There is a fundamental distinction between theory and practice. Sometimes a strategy that should work based on theoretical considerations fails when implemented in practice. This insight has been comically twisted to generate the following …
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Give a Man a Fish, and You Feed Him for a Day. Teach a Man To Fish, and You Feed Him for a Lifetime
Chinese Proverb? Maimonides? Lao-Tzu? Anne Isabella Thackeray Ritchie? Italian Adage? Native American Saying? Mao Zedong? Question for Quote Investigator: The following piece of proverbial wisdom is remarkably astute: Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime. The origin of …