Quote Investigator® – Page 142

Quote Origin: Whatever You Have Read That I Said Is Almost Certainly Untrue, Except If It Is Funny, in Which Case I Definitely Said It

Tallulah Bankhead? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: The movie star Tallulah Bankhead apparently grew tired of seeing misquotations, and she proclaimed that any quotation ascribed to her was inaccurate:

…except if it is funny, in which case I definitely said it.

I thought you might enjoy this topic. What do you think?

Reply from Quote Investigator: In July 1957 “The Philadelphia Inquirer” of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania published a column containing a miscellaneous set of the sayings together with attributions under the title called “Quotes of the Week”. One statement was germane. Emphasis added by QI:¹

Tallulah Bankhead: “Whatever you have read that I said is almost certainly untrue, except if it was funny, in which case I definitely said it.”

Bankhead lived until 1968, and QI believes that this citation provides good support for the accuracy of the ascription. Yet, the statement did not appear directly within an interview which incrementally reduced its credibility.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: I Know I Was Writing Stories When I Was Five

P. G. Wodehouse? John Gardner? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: The popular and prolific humorist P. G. Wodehouse created indelible characters such as Bertie Wooster and Reginald Jeeves. Wodehouse apparently claimed that he was a remarkably precocious author:

I know I was writing stories when I was five.

I haven’t been able to find a solid citation for this. Would you please help?

Reply from Quote Investigator: The prominent literary journal “The Paris Review” published an interview with P. G. Wodehouse in the Winter 1975 issue. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:¹

INTERVIEWER
Did you always know you would be a writer?

WODEHOUSE
Yes, always. I know I was writing stories when I was five. I don’t remember what I did before that. Just loafed, I suppose. I was about twenty when I sold my first story, and I’ve been a full-time writer since 1902. I can’t think of myself as anything but a writer.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: Conspiracy Is the Pursuance of Policies Which They Dare Not Admit in Public

Mark Twain? Ossip Gabrilowitsch? Clara Clemens? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: I’m conducting a research check on a television script containing a definition for the term “conspiracy” credited to Mark Twain. The definition notes that the conspiring participants “dare not admit in public” the secret agreement. Are you familiar with this quotation? Is the attribution to Twain accurate?

Reply from Quote Investigator: The ascription of this conspiracy quotation to Mark Twain is incorrect. Instead, Twain’s son-in-law, a prominent musician named Ossip Gabrilowitsch, probably crafted the quotation.

In 1909 Twain’s daughter Clara Clemens married Gabrilowitsch, a concert pianist who became the director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. He died in 1936, and she published a biographical work titled “My Husband, Gabrilowitsch” in 1938. Clara Clemens included an excerpt from a letter written by Gabrilowitsch who believed that local musicians in Detroit were not being evaluated and hired in an equitable manner by the Symphony Society. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:¹

Do you mean to infer that a man from New York or Boston, all things being equal, should have the preference over the Detroit man and should even receive a larger fee? Neither you nor the Board of Directors would be willing to own up to such a policy. Why, it would amount practically to a conspiracy (for a conspiracy is nothing but a secret agreement of a number of men for the pursuance of policies which they dare not admit in public).

Since the passage above was presented as text from a Gabrilowitsch letter he was the most likely author of the quotation in boldface; however, it remains conceivable that Clara Clemens added the parenthetical elaboration; thus, she was the creator of the statement. Whichever possibility was true, one may still conclude that Mark Twain was not the coiner.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: There Are No Atheists in Foxholes

Plato? Michel de Montaigne? Hannah More? C. V. Hibbard? Warren J. Clear? Ruth Straub? William Thomas Cummings? Ernie Pyle? Anonymous Chaplain? Anonymous Soldier?

Question for Quote Investigator: When exposed to extreme peril many people reflect on the spiritual or supernatural dimension of existence. The following sayings have been particularly popular during times of war. Here are three instances:

There are no atheists at the front.
There are no atheists in the trenches.
There are no atheists in foxholes.

Would you please examine the provenance of these sayings?

Reply from Quote Investigator: The first and second sayings circulated during World War 1, and the third saying spread during World War 2.

A match referring to the front appeared in “The Ormskirk Advertiser” newspaper of Lancashire, England on October 22, 1914. The Lord Bishop of Liverpool read extracts from a letter he had obtained from an unnamed chaplain. The ellipsis occurred in the original text. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:¹

“Do tell the Territorials and soldiers at home that they must know God before they come out, if they would adequately face what lies before them. They will need all the religion they have got, or can have …. There are no atheists at the front, and men are not ashamed to say that though they have not prayed before, they are praying now.”

A match referring to trenches appeared on November 6, 1914 in “The Western Times” newspaper of Devon, England. A speaker at a memorial service for a fallen soldier held at St. Matthias’ Church, Ilsham read from the letter of an unnamed chaplain serving at the front:²

The writer further said, “Tell the Territorials and soldiers at home that they must know God before they come to the front if they would face what lies before them. We have no atheists in the trenches. Men are not ashamed to say that, though they never prayed before, they pray now with all their hearts.”

A match referring to foxholes appeared on April 11, 1942 within a widely distributed story from the Associated Press news service which reported on the fighting and retreat of troops from Bataan in the Philippines. Lieutenant Colonel Warren J. Clear, an officer in the U.S. Army, described an incident during which he heard the foxhole adage spoken by an unnamed sergeant:³

The officer said that he and a sergeant who shared the same fox-hole prayed audibly during one particularly heavy bombing attack. The sergeant, Clear related, observed afterward that “there are no atheists in fox-holes.”

The origin of each of these sayings is uncertain. The most reasonable ascription is anonymous. Yet, some popularizers have been named and citations given further below do list some individuals. Unsurprisingly, non-believers who have served in the military disagree with these adages.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: I Do Not Believe in Ghosts Because I Have Seen Too Many of Them

Samuel Taylor Coleridge? Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley? Don Marquis? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: While perusing the book “Dim Wit: The Stupidest Quotes of All Time” I came across an entertaining topic for Halloween in the following entry about a famous poet:¹

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was asked, “Do you believe in ghosts?” “No, ma’am,” he replied, “I’ve seen too many.” Lucy Finn

Did Coleridge really make this remark?

Reply from Quote Investigator: Yes, there is good evidence that he did make a comment of this type. The context helps to explain what he was trying to communicate.

Coleridge died in 1834, and more than sixty years later in 1895 excerpts from his unpublished notebooks were printed in the work “Anima Poetae”. An entry dated May 12, 1805 discussed an extraordinary episode during which Coleridge saw an apparition. He had been engaged in a long conversation with a companion who said goodbye and retired. Coleridge began to doze for five minutes while sitting in a red armchair. He awoke suddenly and perceived that his companion who had left was somehow still present. He was startled but started to doze again. Awakening he saw the same spectral figure:²

The appearance was very nearly that of a person seen through thin smoke distinct indeed, but yet a sort of distinct shape and color, with a diminished sense of substantiality — like a face in a clear stream.

Coleridge’s skepticism about his own perceptions led him to record information about these mental excursions. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:

Often and often I have had similar experiences, and, therefore, resolved to write down the particulars whenever any new instance should occur, as a weapon against superstition, and an explanation of ghosts — Banquo in “Macbeth” the very same thing. I once told a lady the reason why I did not believe in the existence of ghosts, etc., was that I had seen too many of them myself.

In the passage above Coleridge referred to Lord Banquo who was a character in Shakespeare’s play “Macbeth”; during the course of the drama Banquo was murdered by Lord Macbeth and reappeared as a ghost.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: The Love You Give Away Is the Only Love You Keep

Elbert Hubbard? Apocryphal? Anonymous?

Question for Quote Investigator: I’m intrigued by the following counter-intuitive adage:

The love we give away is the only love we keep.

Would you please explore its provenance?

Reply from Quote Investigator: Elbert Hubbard was the founder of a community of artisans called Roycrofters who were located in East Aurora, New York. He also collected and synthesized adages which appeared in his books and periodicals. The December 1902 edition of “The Philistine” included the following passage from Hubbard. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:¹

The Law of Consequences works both ways: by associating with the sinner and recognizing the good in him, you unconsciously recognize the good in yourself. The love you give away is the only love you keep—by benefiting another you benefit yourself.

The above instance used the pronoun “you” instead of “we”. Hubbard constructed and disseminated a few variant statements.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

I Do Not Believe in Ghosts, But I Am Awfully Afraid of Them

Edgar Allan Poe? Germaine de Staël? Bert Leston Taylor? Charles A. Dana? Anonymous?

Question for Quote Investigator: There is a family of quips that express a comically contradictory attitude toward specters. Here are three instances:

I do not believe in ghosts, but I am awfully afraid of them.
I don’t believe in ghosts, but I’ve been running from them all my life.
I don’t believe in ghosts, but I don’t want to see one.

The master of the macabre Edgar Allan Poe sometimes has received credit for the second statement. Would you please explore this group of jokes for Halloween?

Reply from Quote Investigator: There is no substantive evidence that Edgar Allan Poe employed one of these quips.

Germaine de Staël was an author and influential French intellectual who died in 1817. The physician Sir Henry Holland met Madame de Staël on multiple occasions and dined with her; in 1872 he published a memoir titled “Recollections of Past Life” which included a quotation from de Staël in French about revenants, i.e., ghosts. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:¹

Another trait she discloses, speaking of les revenants: ‘Je n’y crois pas, mais je les crains.’

Here is one possible translation of the French:

‘I do not believe, but I’m afraid.’

When Holland’s book was reviewed in “The London Quarterly Review” and “Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine”² the remark from Madame de Staël was reprinted which widened its distribution.

Also in 1872 the notable writer and conversationalist Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. published “The Poet at the Breakfast-Table” in which he presented a slightly different version of the quotation and ascribed the words to an unnamed “famous woman”:³

We are all tattoed in our cradles with the beliefs of our tribe; the record may seem superficial, but it is indelible. You cannot educate a man wholly out of the superstitious fears which were early implanted in his imagination; no matter how utterly his reason may reject them, he will still feel as the famous woman did about ghosts, Je ne les crois pas, mais je les crains, — “I don’t believe in them, but I am afraid of them, nevertheless.”

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: When You’re Accustomed to Privilege, Equality Feels Like Oppression

Stephanie Herrera? Chris Boeskool? Mike Jebbett? Jesse Alan Downs? Brian Sims? Clay Shirky? Anonymous?

Question for Quote Investigator: Activists have formulated an adage about privilege that has achieved wide distribution:

When you’re accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression

Would you please examine its provenance?

Reply from Quote Investigator: This thought can be expressed in many ways; hence, it has been difficult to trace. The earliest close match located by QI appeared in December 2010 on the website: “Are Women Human?: Debunking gender myths”. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:¹

I’ve seen a quote, something like “To the privileged, equality feels like oppression.”

This instance was more concise than the modern version. It was written by a commentator using the handle “Faith”, but she disclaimed authorship by using the phrase “I’ve seen the quote”. Hence, the expression was already in circulation. Indeed, the existence of precursors occurring by 1997 suggests that the statement evolved over time.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: Leave Him With a Favorable Opinion of Himself

Samuel Taylor Coleridge? Tryon Edwards? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: My favorite poem is “Kubla Khan; or, A Vision in a Dream: A Fragment” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. I love the poem’s opium inspired image of a “stately pleasure dome”. Serendipitously, I came across an insightful remark ascribed to Coleridge that contrasted different types of intellects:

If you would stand well with a great mind, leave him with a favorable impression of yourself; if with a little mind, leave him with a favorable impression of himself.

Unfortunately, I have not been able to find this in Coleridge’s oeuvre. Is this attribution accurate?

Reply from Quote Investigator: The acclaimed poet and critic Samuel Taylor Coleridge did pen a very similar remark within his critical analysis of a book by Sir Thomas Browne. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:¹

The difference between a great mind’s and a little mind’s use of history is this. The latter would consider, for instance, what Luther did, taught, or sanctioned: the former, what Luther,—a Luther,—would now do, teach, and sanction. This thought occurred to me at midnight, Tuesday, the 16th of March, 1824, as I was stepping into bed,—my eye having glanced on Luther’s Table Talk.

If you would be well with a great mind, leave him with a favorable impression of you;—if with a little mind, leave him with a favorable opinion of himself.

Coleridge died in 1834, and the excerpt above appeared in a posthumous 1836 collection titled “The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge” edited by his uncle, Henry Nelson Coleridge.

The modern saying provided by the questioner evolved from the original statement. The phrase “be well” was changed to “stand well”; “you” was changed to “yourself”; and “opinion” was changed to “impression”.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Quote Origin: When Painters Get Together They Talk About Where You Can Buy the Best Turpentine

Pablo Picasso? Jean Renoir? Garson Kanin? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: Critics discuss abstruse theories of creativity and engage in esoteric scrutiny of aesthetics while artists are primarily concerned with the practical. Admittedly, this is an oversimplification. Here is a statement that makes a similar point:

When art critics get together they talk about form and structure and meaning. When artists get together they talk about where you can buy cheap turpentine.

Did Picasso really say this?

Reply from Quote Investigator: The earliest evidence of a comparable expression located by QI appeared in a 1966 book by the screenwriter and director Garson Kanin who ascribed the words to Picasso:¹

Picasso says that when art critics get together they talk about content, style, trend and meaning, but that when painters get together they talk about where can you get the best turpentine.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.