The Oxford dictionary of modern quotations (69 page)

1852-1928

See Herbert Henry Asquith (1.60)

16.0 P =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

16.1 Vance Packard =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1914-

The hidden persuaders.

Title of book (1957)

16.2 William Tyler Page =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1868-1942

I believe in the United States of America as a government of the people,

by the people, for the people, whose just powers are derived from the

consent of the governed; a democracy in a republic; a sovereign Nation of

many sovereign States; a perfect Union, one and inseparable, established

upon those principles of freedom, equality, justice, and humanity for

which American patriots sacrificed their lives and fortunes. I therefore

believe it is my duty to my country to love it, to support its

Constitution, to obey its laws, to respect its flag, and to defend it

against all enemies.

American's Creed (prize-winning competition entry, 3 Apr. 1918) in

Congressional Record vol. 56, pt. 12 (appendix), p. 286

16.3 Reginald Paget =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1908-

There is no disguise or camouflage about the Prime Minister. He is the

original banana man, yellow outside and a softer yellow inside.

Of Sir Anthony Eden in a House of Commons debate, Hansard 14 Sept. 1956,

col. 432

16.4 Gerald Page-Wood =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

It beats as it sweeps as it cleans.

Advertising slogan for Hoover vacuum cleaners, devised in 1919, in Nigel

Rees Slogans (1982) p. 40

16.5 Revd Ian Paisley =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1926-

I would rather be British than just.

Remark to Bernadette Devlin, Oct. 1969, reported by Sunday Times Insight

Team in Ulster (1972) ch. 3

16.6 Michael Palin =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1943-

See Graham Chapman et al. (3.47)

16.7 Norman Panama and Melvin Frank =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Norman Panama 1914-

Melvin Frank 1913-1988

The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle. The chalice

from the palace has the brew that is true.

Court Jester (1955 film; words spoken--with difficulty--by Danny Kaye)

I'll take a lemonade!...In a dirty glass!

Road to Utopia (1946 film; words spoken by Bob Hope)

16.8 Dame Christabel Pankhurst =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1880-1958

Never lose your temper with the Press or the public is a major rule of

political life.

Unshackled (1959) ch. 5

We are here to claim our right as women, not only to be free, but to fight

for freedom. That it is our right as well as our duty. It is our

privilege, as well as our pride and our joy, to take some part in this

militant movement which, as we believe, means the regeneration of all

humanity.

Speech in London, 23 Mar. 1911, in Votes for Women 31 Mar. 1911

16.9 Emmeline Pankhurst =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1858-1928

After all, is not a woman's life, is not her health, are not her limbs

more valuable than panes of glass? There is no doubt of that, but most

important of all, does not the breaking of glass produce more effect upon

the Government?

Speech on 16 Feb. 1912, in My Own Story (1914) p. 213

There is something that Governments care far more for than human life, and

that is the security of property, and so it is through property that we

shall strike the enemy....Be militant each in your own way. Those of you

who can express your militancy by going to the House of Commons and

refusing to leave without satisfaction, as we did in the early days--do

so....And my last word is to the Government: I incite this meeting to

rebellion. I say to the Government: You have not dared to take the

leaders of Ulster for their incitement to rebellion. Take me if you dare.

Speech at Albert Hall, 17 Oct. 1912, in My Own Story (1914) p. 265

16.10 Emmeline Pankhurst, Dame Christabel Pankhurst, and Annie Kenney =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Emmeline Pankhurst 1858-1928

Dame Christabel Pankhurst 1880-1958

Annie Kenney 1879-1953

We laid our plans to begin this work at a great meeting to be held in the

Free Trade Hall, Manchester [on 13 Oct. 1905] with Sir Edward Grey as the

principal speaker. We intended to get seats in the gallery, directly

facing the platform and we made for the occasion a large banner with the

words "Will the Liberal Party Give Votes for Women?" ...At the last

moment, however, we had to alter the plan because it was impossible to get

the gallery seats we wanted. There was no way in which we could use our

large banner, so...we cut out and made a small banner with the three-word

inscription "Votes for Women." Thus, quite accidentally, there came into

existence the present slogan of the suffrage movement around the world.

Emmeline Pankhurst My Own Story (1914) ch. 3

16.11 Charlie Parker =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1920-1955

Music is your own experience, your thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't

live it, it won't come out of your horn.

In Nat Shapiro and Nat Hentoff Hear Me Talkin' to Ya (1955) p. 358

16.12 Dorothy Parker =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1893-1967

One more drink and I'd have been under the host.

In Howard Teichmann George S. Kaufman (1972) p. 68

You can always tell that the crash is coming when I start getting tender

about Our Dumb Friends. Three highballs and I think I'm St Francis of

Assisi.

Here Lies (1939) "Just a Little One"

And I'll stay off Verlaine too; he was always chasing Rimbauds.

Here Lies (1939) "The Little Hours"

I'm never going to be famous. My name will never be writ large on the

roster of Those Who Do Things. I don't do anything. Not one single thing.

I used to bite my nails, but I don't even do that any more.

Here Lies (1939) "The Little Hours"

Sorrow is tranquillity remembered in emotion.

Here Lies (1939) "Sentiment." Cf. Oxford Dictionary of Quotations (1979)

583:10

At intermission [in the 1933 premiere of The Lake], Dorothy Parker turned

to a companion and made her famous quip: "Katharine Hepburn runs the gamut

from A to B."

In G. Carey Katharine Hepburn (1985) ch. 6

The affair between Margot Asquith and Margot Asquith will live as one of

the prettiest love stories in all literature.

Review of Margot Asquith's Lay Sermons in New Yorker 22 Oct. 1927, in A

Month of Saturdays (1970) p. 10

And it is that word "hummy," my darlings, that marks the first place in

"The House at Pooh Corner" at which Tonstant Weader fwowed up.

New Yorker 20 Oct. 1928 (review by Dorothy Parker as "Constant Reader")

Where's the man could ease a heart like a satin gown?

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "The Satin Dress"

By the time you say you're his,

Shivering and sighing

And he vows his passion is

Infinite, undying--

Lady, make a note of this:

One of you is lying.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Unfortunate Coincidence"

Four be the things I'd been better without:

Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Inventory"

Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,

A medley of extemporanea;

And love is a thing that can never go wrong;

And I am Marie of Roumania.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Comment"

Razors pain you

Rivers are damp;

Acids stain you;

And drugs cause cramp.

Guns aren't lawful;

Nooses give;

Gas smells awful;

You might as well live.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "R�sum�"

Why is it no one ever sent me yet

One perfect limousine, do you suppose?

Ah no, it's always just my luck to get

One perfect rose.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "One Perfect Rose"

Men seldom make passes

At girls who wear glasses.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "News Item"

Woman wants monogamy;

Man delights in novelty.

Love is woman's moon and sun;

Man has other forms of fun.

Woman lives but in her lord;

Count to ten, and man is bored.

With this the gist and sum of it,

What earthly good can come of it?

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "General Review of the Sex Situation"

Whose love is given over-well

Shall look on Helen's face in hell

Whilst they whose love is thin and wise

Shall see John Knox in Paradise.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Partial Comfort"

Accursed from birth they be

Who seek to find monogamy,

Pursuing it from bed to bed--

I think they would be better dead.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Reuben's Children"

If, with the literate, I am

Impelled to try an epigram,

I never seek to take the credit;

We all assume that Oscar said it.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "A Pig's-Eye View of Literature"

Drink and dance and laugh and lie,

Love, the reeling midnight through,

For tomorrow we shall die!

(But, alas, we never do.)

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "The Flaw in Paganism"

He lies below, correct in cypress wood,

And entertains the most exclusive worms.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Tombstones in the Starlight no. 3, Epitaph

for a Very Rich Man"

Scratch a lover, and find a foe.

Not So Deep as a Well (1937) "Ballade of a Great Weariness"

There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth

in it; wise-cracking is simply callisthenics with words.

In Paris Review Summer 1956, p. 81

House Beautiful is play lousy.

Review in New Yorker (1933), in Phyllis Hartnoll Plays and Players (1984)

p. 89

Excuse My Dust.

Suggested epitaph for herself (1925), in Alexander Woollcott While Rome

Burns (1934) "Our Mrs Parker"

That woman speaks eighteen languages, and can't say No in any of them.

In Alexander Woollcott While Rome Burns (1934) "Our Mrs Parker"

And there was that wholesale libel on a Yale prom. If all the girls

attending it were laid end to end, Mrs Parker said, she wouldn't be at all

surprised.

Alexander Woollcott While Rome Burns (1934) "Our Mrs Parker"

"Good work, Mary," our Mrs Parker wired collect [to Mrs Sherwood on the

arrival of her baby]. "We all knew you had it in you."

Alexander Woollcott While Rome Burns (1934) "Our Mrs Parker"

How do they know?

Reaction to the death of President Calvin Coolidge in 1933, in Malcolm

Cowley Writers at Work 1st Series (1958) p. 65

As artists they're rot, but as providers they're oil wells; they gush.

Comment on lady novelists in Malcolm Cowley Writers at Work 1st Series

(1958) p. 69

Hollywood money isn't money. It's congealed snow, melts in your hand, and

there you are.

In Malcolm Cowley Writers at Work 1st Series (1958) p. 81

Brevity is the soul of lingerie, as the Petticoat said to the Chemise.

Caption written for Vogue (1916) in John Keats You Might as well Live

(1970) p. 32. Cf. Shakespeare's Hamlet act 2, sc. 2: "Brevity is the soul

of wit"

You can lead a horticulture, but you can't make her think.

On being challenged to use "horticulture" in a sentence, in John Keats You

Might as well Live (1970) p. 46

It serves me right for putting all my eggs in one bastard.

On her abortion, in John Keats You Might as well Live (1970) pt. 2, ch. 3

16.13 Dorothy Parker, Alan Campbell, and Robert Carson =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Dorothy Parker 1893-1967

Alan Campbell 1905-1963

Robert Carson 1910-1983

A star is born.

Title of film (1937)

16.14 Ross Parker and Hugh Charles =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Ross Parker 1914-1974

Hugh Charles 1907-

There'll always be an England

While there's a country lane,

Wherever there's a cottage small

Beside a field of grain.

There'll always be an England (1939 song)

We'll meet again, don't know where,

Don't know when,

But I know we'll meet again some sunny day.

We'll Meet Again (1939 song)

16.15 C. Northcote Parkinson =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1909-

Expenditure rises to meet income.

The Law and the Profits (1960) opening sentence

Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.

Parkinson's Law (1958) p. 4

It might be termed the Law of Triviality. Briefly stated, it means that

the time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to