Tracing Quotations
Arturo Toscanini? Georges Clemenceau? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: According to legend the prominent conductor Arturo Toscanini expressed disrespect for the famous composer Richard Strauss during an incident in the 1930s. To understand this incident it is helpful to know that removing one’s hat was a gesture of respect in the European culture shared by the …
Continue reading “I Take My Hat Off To You as a Composer; I Put Back Ten Hats as a Man”
Edmund Burke? Anselme Batbie? Victor Hugo? King Oscar II of Sweden? George Bernard Shaw? François Guizot? Jules Claretie? Georges Clemenceau? Benjamin Disraeli? Winston Churchill? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Some individuals change their political orientation as they grow older. There is a family of sayings that present a mordant judgment on this ideological evolution. Here are …
Ogden Nash? George Bernard Shaw? James Agate? La Liberté? Winston Churchill? Henry James? Oscar Wilde? Georges Clemenceau? Dear Quote Investigator: There is a famous humorous saying about the United States that has been credited to four celebrated wits: George Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde, Winston Churchill, and Georges Clemenceau: America is the only country that went …
Charles De Gaulle? Georges Clemenceau? Elbert Hubbard? R. C. O’Brien? Vladmir Bjornberg? Seth Wiggins? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: I would love to have a specific citation for the following quotation. Here are two versions that I’ve seen many times: 1) The graveyards are full of indispensable men. 2) The cemeteries are full of indispensable men. …
Continue reading “The Graveyards Are Full of Indispensable Men”