Tag: Ellen Parr

Dorothy Parker? Ellen Parr? Anonymous?

Dear Quote Investigator: The following statement about curiosity has been attributed to the well-known wit Dorothy Parker and someone named Ellen Parr:

The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.

Would you please examine the provenance of this saying?

Quote Investigator: The earliest instance of this quotation known to QI appeared in “Reader’s Digest” in December 1980 in a column called “Quotable Quotes” where the words were ascribed to Parr. Boldface has been added to excerpts:^[1] 1980 December, Reader’s Digest, Volume 117, Quotable Quotes, Quote Page 172, The Reader’s Digest Association. (Verified on microfilm)

The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.
—Ellen Parr

Dorothy Parker died in 1967, and there is no substantive evidence that she employed this saying. The two names “Parr” and “Parker” are alphabetically very close, and QI conjectures that a mistake led to the reassignment of the saying from Parr to Parker based on a known mechanism for misattribution. A more extensive explanation is given further below.

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

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