Tracing Quotations
Groucho Marx? Anthony Oettinger? Susumu Kuno? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: The simile “Time flies like an arrow” compares the rapidity of the passage of time to the quickness of a darting arrow. However, there exist alternative interpretations of the phrase. Here are two possibilities: (1) A particular type of flies called “time flies” are …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: Time Flies Like an Arrow; Fruit Flies Like a Banana”
Gary Cooper? Lee Neuwirth? Henry Miller? Moses Hadas? Question for Quote Investigator: I was told that a prominent journal editor would sometimes write a rejection letter to an author that said his or her “paper fills a much-needed gap”. Is this true? Reply from Quote Investigator: This post continues the investigation of the phrase “much …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: This Book Fills a Much-Needed Gap – Part 02”
Question for Quote Investigator: I once read that the funniest book review ever written begins with the sentence: “This book fills a much-needed gap”. Does this book review actually exist? Reply from Quote Investigator: Remarkably, the phrase mentioned does appear in many book reviews and other evaluations. For years writers have been incongruously eager to …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: This Book Fills a Much-Needed Gap – Part 01”
Question for Quote Investigator: There is a great quote by Plato or Socrates about the misbehavior of children in antiquity that I read in the New York Times. The quote shows that the problems between generations are not just a recent occurrence. Instead, the conflicts between parents and offspring are timeless: The children now love …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: Misbehaving Children in Ancient Times”
Charles Dickens? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: In a book on corporate communications I read a quote that supposedly was said by Dickens: Electric communication will never be a substitute for the face of someone who with their soul encourages another person to be brave and true. Charles Dickens I find this quote hard to …
Mark Twain? Charles Dudley Warner? Question for Quote Investigator: There is a classic Mark Twain quotation about the weather that I have used for years. Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it. However, recently I visited the Bartleby website and discovered that the reference work Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations …
Have you ever enjoyed reading or hearing a clever quotation? Have you ever repeated the quote along with the attribution but wondered if the information was accurate? This blog tries to track down correct information about the provenance of sayings by utilizing the massive text databases that are being constructed right now along with other …