Yogi Berra? Paul Valéry? Laura Riding? Robert Graves? Anonymous?
Dear Quote Investigator: I am interested in a saying that is both humorous and shrewd:
The future is not what it used to be.
I have seen several other versions of the saying. The phrasing that uses the word “ain’t” is often credited to Yogi Berra:
The future ain’t what it used to be.
The future’s not what it was.
The future isn’t what it used to be.
The future is no longer what it used to be.
Who should be credited with this witty and sometimes rueful comment?
Quote Investigator: The baseball great Yogi Berra writing in his 1998 volume “The Yogi Book” did claim that he used this expression. A precise timeframe was not given, but the saying was accompanied with a picture from 1974. Yogi also offered an interpretation:[1]1998, “The Yogi Book: I really didn’t say everything I said!” by Yogi Berra, Page 118 -119, Workman Publishing, New York. (Verified on paper)
I just meant that times are different. Not necessarily better or worse. Just different.
The earliest evidence of this saying located by QI was published in 1937 in a journal called “Epilogue” within an article titled “From a Private Correspondence on Reality” by Laura Riding and Robert Graves. The authors who were both prominent literary figures asserted that the perception of the future had changed:[2]1937 Spring, Epilogue: A Critical Summary, Volume III, Journal edited by Laura Riding and Robert Graves, Article: “From a Private Correspondence on Reality” by Laura Riding and Robert … Continue reading
The human mind has reached the end of temporal progress: the future is not what it used to be, and people talk with less and less progenitive self-precipitation into the future, and behave with more and more fatally decisive immediacy. The future, that is, contains nothing but scientific development. It is an involuntary spending and manipulation of physical forces, empty of consciousness: it no longer matters.
Also in 1937 the poet and philosopher Paul Valéry wrote a version of the phrase in French in the essay “Notre Destin et Les Lettres”. In 1948 his words were translated and published in English in “Our Destiny and Literature” which was part of the collection “Reflections on the World Today”. Here is the French statement and the English translation with additional context:[3] 2012, The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs, Compiled by Charles Clay Doyle, Wolfgang Mieder, and Fred R. Shapiro Page 90, Column 2, Yale University Press, New Haven.(Verified on paper)
L’avenir est comme le reste: il n’est plus ce qu’il était
The future, like everything else, is no longer quite what it used to be. By that I mean we can no longer think of it with any confidence in our inductions.
The above Valéry citation is listed in the important reference “The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs” from Yale University Press.
Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.
Continue reading “The Future Is Not What It Used To Be”
References
↑1 | 1998, “The Yogi Book: I really didn’t say everything I said!” by Yogi Berra, Page 118 -119, Workman Publishing, New York. (Verified on paper) |
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↑2 | 1937 Spring, Epilogue: A Critical Summary, Volume III, Journal edited by Laura Riding and Robert Graves, Article: “From a Private Correspondence on Reality” by Laura Riding and Robert Graves, Reprinted in: 2001, “Essays from ‘Epilogue’ 1935-1937” by Laura Riding, Robert Graves, Edited by Mark Jacobs, Start Page 163, Quote Page 170, Carcanet Press Limited, Manchester, United Kingdom. (Verified on paper in 2001 reprint) |
↑3 | 2012, The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs, Compiled by Charles Clay Doyle, Wolfgang Mieder, and Fred R. Shapiro Page 90, Column 2, Yale University Press, New Haven.(Verified on paper) |