Tracing Quotations
Richard Bach? Jess Lair? Anonymous student? Sting? Peter Max? Chantal Sicile? Dear Quote Investigator: On his first solo album in 1985 the musician Sting released a song called: If You Love Somebody Set Them Free Recently, I heard more elaborate quotations that included the above statement: If you love something, let it go. If it …
Continue reading “If You Love Someone, Set Them Free. If They Come Back They’re Yours”
Andy Warhol? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The expression “fifteen minutes of fame” is based on a quotation by the influential Pop artist Andy Warhol. But what exactly did he say and when did he say it? Quote Investigator: Warhol’s notable maxim about the transience of fame has been popular for much longer than the standard …
Continue reading “In the Future Everyone Will Be Famous for 15 Minutes”
Albert Einstein? Samuel Johnson? Sophonisba Breckinridge? John Brunner? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: The depth and breadth of information available on the internet is wondrous. Here are three examples from a family of pertinent sayings I came across recently: 1) I don’t need to know everything; I just need to know where to find it, …
Continue reading “You Don’t Have to Know Everything. You Just Have to Know Where to Find It”
Bertrand Russell? William James? Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.? Question for Quote Investigator: The eminent philosopher Bertrand Russell discussed visions and experiences in his major opus “A History of Western Philosophy” in 1945. Russell noted that subjective experiences were not always reliable: William James describes a man who got the experience from …
William James? Dorothy Parker? Ogden Nash? Mrs. Amos Pinchot? Alice Duer Miller? Apocryphal? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: I read a wild story about William James, the prominent psychologist, educator, and philosopher. One night he experimented with the psychoactive gas nitrous oxide, commonly known as laughing gas. While experiencing a reverie James became convinced that he …
Continue reading “Hogamous, Higamous, Man is Polygamous, Higamous, Hogamous, Woman is Monagamous”
George Bernard Shaw? Winston Churchill? Randolph Churchill? Noel Coward? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The sharpest example of repartee that I have ever heard about was a famous exchange between George Bernard Shaw and Winston Churchill about a pair of tickets to a play. Shaw: I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my …
Continue reading “Here are Two Tickets for the Opening of My Play. Bring a Friend—If You Have One”
Mark Twain? Heinrich Heine? Otto von Bismarck? George Bernard Shaw? James Boswell? Will Rogers? Dear Quote Investigator: As a one-time resident of Cincinnati I knew that Mark Twain once worked in the city, and I always enjoyed the comment he reportedly made about it: When the end of the world comes, I want to be …
Ulysses S. Grant? Rutherford B. Hayes? Howard Pew? George Peck? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: A quotation about the telephone has been in the news recently because it was used in a speech by U.S. President Barack Obama. A widely-distributed anecdote asserted that Rutherford B. Hayes participated in a demonstration of the telephone when it was …
Continue reading “Great Invention, But Who Would Ever Want to Use One?”
Samuel Goldwyn? Ezra Goodman? Robert Gessner? Dear Quote Investigator: The supply of comical lines credited to the Hollywood chief Samuel Goldwyn seems endless. Here is one that I love: I don’t think anyone should write their autobiography until after they’re dead. But I have become rather skeptical of these jokes because no one seems to …
Continue reading ““Will You Write an Autobiography?” “Not Until Long After I’m Dead””
Cary Grant? Mary Astor? Hugh O’Brian? Danny Doakes? Herschel Bernardi? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: I read an article last year about celebrity lookalikes that discussed the different stages of a Hollywood career. I remember a few of the stages: Get me John/Jane Smith. Get me someone who looks like John/Jane Smith. Who is John/Jane Smith. …