Some of the best things ever said

Extracts from The 637 best things anybody ever said ( 1982) by Robert Byrne.

 Everyone should believe in something; I believe I will have another drink.  

Unknown.

The trouble with born-again Christians is that they are an even bigger pain the second time around.

Herb Caen.

I have a new philosophy. I’m only going to dread one day at a time.

Charles Schulz

Life is what happens when you are making other plans

John Lennon

I’m not afraid to die. I just don’t want to be there when it happens.

Woody Allen

The best way to get praise is to die

Italian proverb

There is no such thing as inner peace. There is only nervousness and death.

Fran Liebowitz

For three days after death hair and fingernails continue to grow but phone calls taper off

Johnny Carson

One murder makes a villain, millions a hero

Beilby Porteus

There is no money in poetry, but then there is no poetry in money, either

Robert Graves

The only reason some people get lost in thought is because it’s unfamiliar territory

Paul Fix

Only the mediocre are always at their best

Jean Giraudoux

I’m going to speak my mind because I have nothing to lose

S. I. Hayakawa

I live in the crown of jollity, not so much to enjoy company as to shun myself

Samuel Johnson.

For every ten jokes thou hast got an hundred enemies

Laurence Sterne

Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow

Oscar Wilde

He who laughs, lasts

Mary Pettibone Poole (c 1938)

The affair between Margot Asquith and Margo Asquith will live as one of the prettiest love stories in all literature.

Dorothy Parker (in a review of a book by Margot Asquith.)

Like all self-made men he worships his creator

Unknown

Egotist: A person more interested in himself than in me.

Ambrose Bierce

A narcissist is someone better looking than you are

Gore Vidal

Don’t be humble. You’re not that great

Golda Meir

Somewhere on this globe, every ten seconds, there is a woman giving birth to a child. She must be found and stopped.

Sam Levenson

A vegetarian is a person who won’t eat anything that can have children

David Brenner

Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own.

Aristotle

The reason grandparents and grandchildren get along so well is that they have a common enemy

Sam Levenson

Sex drive; a physical craving that begins in adolescence and ends at marriage..

Robert Byrne

Last time I tried to make love to my wife nothing was happening, so I said to her “ What’s the matter, you can’t think of anybody either ?”

Rodney Dangerfield

The only really indecent people are the chaste

J. K. Huysmans

I hate women because they always know where things are

James Thurber

The heaviest object in the world is the body of the women you have ceased to love

Marquis de Luc de Clapiers Vauvenargues

A man can be happy with any woman as long as he does not love her.

Oscar Wilde

It is better to have loved and lost than never to have lost at all

Samuel Butler.

Marriage is not a word but a sentence

Unknown

I tended to place my wife under a pedestal

Woody Allen

What scares me about divorce is that my children might put me in a home for unwed mothers

Teressa Skelton.

It is better to be a coward for a minute than be dead for the rest of your life 

Irish proverb.

Nobody has bet enough on a winning horse

Overheard at a track by Richard Sasuly

There is nothing so absurd but some philosopher has said it

Cicero

A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.

George Bernard Shaw

A piano is a piano is a piano–Gertrude Steinway

Unknown

Every journalist has a novel in him, which is an excellent place for it.

Russell Lynes

Every novel should have a beginning, a muddle and an end

Peter de Vries

Income tax returns are the most imaginative fiction being written today

Herman Wouk

Any ordinary man can…surround himself with two thousand books…and thenceforward have at least one place in the world in which it is possible to be happy

Augustine Birrell.

Studying literature at Harvard is like learning about women at the Mayo Clinic.

Roy Blount jun.

‘Twas a woman who drove me to drink, and I never had the courtesy to thank her for it.

W. C. Fields

I drink to make other people more interesting

George Jean Nathan.

I’d rather have a free bottle in front of me than a prefrontal lobotomy

Unknown

I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they’ve always worked for me.

Hunter S. Thompson

To be continued.

R. M. Healey

First Lines

In her anthology entitled First Lines (1985) Gemma O’Connor declared that few celebrated writers in English opened their novels and memoirs with arresting first lines. Dickens, Joyce, and Jane Austen were a handful that did, but others, like Hardy and De Quincey, managed to keep the readers’ attention without providing intriguing first lines. Perhaps it’s gift that certain writers of fiction (O’Connor  excludes poets from her anthology) had, regardless of their eminence. Short story writers, like James Stephens and Saki, were masters of this art and indeed most writers of this type of fiction were aware that they needed to start well. Here are some of the most memorable first lines selected by Ms O’Connor. Guessing the authors of them might make an amusing party game.

This book is largely concerned with Hobbits.

J. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings.

I hate to read new books.

William Hazlitt, One Reading Old Books.

It is difficult for a man to speak long of himself without vanity; therefore I shall be short.

David Hume, Life, written by himself.

Let me tell you the story of my life.

Maxim Gorky, A Confession.

Once upon a time, and I very good time it was….

James Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…

Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities.

Ours is essentially a tragic age….

Continue reading →

When writers attack

We at Jot 101 are always looking for new examples of bilious, scornful or downright libellous remarks. A number of collections have been scoured and selections made, but in Matthew Parris’s Scorn with extra bile ( 1998) we seem to have found a truly impressive collection of insults, including a very well known one from my own uncle, the first Baron Riddlesden ( aka Denis Healey ).

Some of the better insults are, alas, too long for inclusion, but here are some by writers that are equally entertaining, but pithier. There is also a hilarious semi-parody of the somewhat overrated children’s writer A.A. Milne by Dorothy Parker (photo above).

…an umbrella left behind at a picnic.

George Moore on W. B. Yeats.

A church lit but without a congregation to distract you, with every light and line focused on the high altar. And on the altar, very reverently placed, intensely there, is a dead kitten, an eggshell, a bit of string.

H.G. Wells on a book by Henry James.

A hack writer who would not have been considered fourth rate in Europe, who tried out a few of the old proven ‘ sure-fire’ literary skeletons with sufficient local colour to intrigue the superficial and the lazy.

William Faulkner on Mark Twain

I wish her characters would talk a little less like the heroes and heroines of police reports

George Eliot on Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

I cannot abide Conrad’s souvenir shop style and bottled ships and necklaces of romanticist clichés.

Vladimir Nabokov on Joseph Conrad

Tell me, when you are alone with Max, does he take off his face and reveal his mask ?

Oscar Wilde on Max Beerbohm.

Continue reading →

Leonard Rossiter

The Lowest Form of Wit

Now that the season of good will to all men is behind us Jot 101 can safely tackle the art of sarcasm, examples of which can be found in a compilation published by the gifted comic actor  Leonard Rossiter ( The Rise and Fall of Reginald Perrin, Rising Damp) in The Lowest Form of Wit (1981).

Now I ‘ didn’t get where I am today ‘ by insisting that all the items   included in his book are good or even funny examples of sarcasm, but here are some of the better ones:-

The novelist James Joyce had an encounter with a fan, a woman who grabbed his hand and asked him fervently:

‘ May I kiss the hand that wrote Ulysses ?’

‘ No’, Joyce told her. ‘ It did other things too.’

Fred Keating once remarked of the actress Tallulah Bankhead:

‘I’ve just spend an hour talking to Tallulah for a few minutes.’

Of Hollywood Rex Reed remarked:

‘Hollywood is where if you don’t have happiness you send out for it.’

Margaret Kendal called Sarah Bernhardt:

‘ A great actress from the waist down.’

And Somerset Maugham , watching Spencer Tracy on set during the filming of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde asked a friend beside him:

‘Which is he playing now?’ 

Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree was nothing if not dramatic in his entrances on stage, always contriving to make the greatest impact on an audience when he appeared for the first time. So, on the opening might of his latest play, he flung open a pair of double- doors centre-stage, at the back of the set, and stood there for a moment holding an impressive attitude and looking straight out into the house. He was just about to launch into his first speech when he was pre—empted by a voice from the goods shouting:

‘Next station Marble Arch!’

Horace Walpole commented on the on the works of Samuel Richardson:

‘The works of Richardson …are pictures of high life as conceived by a bookseller, and romances as they would be spiritualized by a Methodist preacher.’

Oscar Wilde on Hall Caine:

Continue reading →

More anecdotes of famous writers and two others

Jot 101 howlers pic of Cecil Hunt

( extracted from Fun with the Famous by H. Cecil Hunt (1928)

 

Sir James Barrie

 When asked to give his recipe for successful writing, his  reply was typical of the man, and, of course, it was scribbled on a crumpled sheet of tobacco wrapping:

 

Journalism: 2 pipes      = 1 hour

2 hours      = 1 idea

1 idea        = 3 paragraphs

3 pars         = I leader.

 

Fiction:      8 pipes         = 1 ounce

7 ounces       = 1 week

2 weeks        = 1 chapter

20 chapters   = 1 nib

2 nibs            = I novel

 

Winston Churchill (the novelist)

 

Mr Churchill has a namesake, an American novelist who is his senior by a few years. It is said that when the American writer first published a novel he received a notes from the British Winston Churchill protesting against the unwarranted use of his distinguished and uncommon name. To this protest came this amusing reply:

“Dear Sir, How interesting ! Is there really another Winston Churchill ? Yours truly, Winston Churchill.”

 

Dr Samuel Johnson

 

A characteristic but little known Johnson story must be included, because Johnson means so much in British humour. At a dinner party in London the little man held the table by his brilliant talk and ready wit. During a pause in the conversation he took a rather generous mouthful of hot potato, which he rapidly returned to his plate by the quickest, if not the most polite method. Without a moment’s hesitation he looked round at the circle of somewhat startled countenances, and said quite calmly:

“A fool would have swallowed that “. Continue reading →

Some anecdotes from ‘Fun with the Famous’ by H. Cecil Hunt (1928)

Jot 101 Kipling's home in sussex

 

Funny book titles in Prince Edward’s Library.

 

In the library of the Prince of Wales (later Edward VIII) at Marlborough House were many false book spines inscribed with amusing titles, most dating from the Victorian age. The following particularly amused the Prince.

 

Boyle on Steam.

 

Lady Godiva on the Horse

 

Constable’s notes on motoring.

 

Bacon’s History of Greece

 

Nine Tales of a Cat

 

The Voyage of Noah by Arkwright.

 

Payne’s Dentistry

 

Warm Receptions by Burns

 

First Sight by Lovett.

 

Spare the Tree by Hewett

 

Cochin’s Lays of China.

 

‘The Prince is often amused at visitors who cannot find their way out of this quaint library. There is no apparent exit, but one of the morocco volumes bears the title “ The Passage Out “, and it is in the centre of the door, so that the discerning explorer soon has a clue to his escape.’

 

Charles Wesley meets ‘ Beau’ Nash.

 

The great Wesley once had an encounter with the pompous Beau Nash. The meeting was in a narrow street, and the right of way obviously belonged to the divine. The dandy, drawing himself up proudly, said in his most haughty manner:

“I never make way for fools.”. I always do”, said Wesley, quickly stepping aside.

 

Kipling’s autographs

 

A comical situation arose some years ago when the writer made a habit of paying even small bills by cheque. He found that his balance was much larger than the counterfoils of his cheque-book warranted. It was discovered that local tradesmen never cashed his cheques. They found that admiring visitors would often willingly but them for much more than the values for which they were drawn. [Above is Kipling’s house in Sussex] Continue reading →

‘Eddie’ – tributes to Sir Edward Marsh

Found in a book* of tributes to Sir Edward Marsh, these two pieces unknown to the web - the foreword by Winston Churchill and the 'Tailpiece' by Max Beerbohm. Wikipedia (who regard him as a polymath) has this on him. Very clever, amusing, retiring, gay, one of the 'great and the good' and a patron of the arts - it is hard to think of a modern equivalent. Churchill, whom he served as Private Secretary for many years, attended his memorial and here contributes a touching piece on 'Eddie.' Beerbohm, who regarded him as 'not unalarming' also recognised him as 'one of the ornaments of his time.'

Foreword

Winston Churchill 

The friendship of Eddie Marsh is a memory which I put high among my treasures. We began working together at the Colonial Office in 1905 and from then onwards out association remained intimate and happy for nearly fifty years. He was not only an admirable Civil Servant, on whose judgement, loyalty, and competence I could always count, but he was a master of literature and scholarship, a deeply instructed champion of the arts, and a man for whom the esteem of his friends could not fail to be combined with their deepest affection. His serenity in all things made his companionship a pleasure; and his noble and generous nature made him an unfailing joy to men and woman of all generations who were so fortunate as to walk with him along the road. 


Tailpiece

Max Beerbohm

Eddie 

I do not remember having anywhere at any time heard him spoken of by anyone as Edward Marsh. And yet, with his tufted eyebrows and his monocle, and his sharply chiselled features, and his laconic mode of speech, he was not, one would have thought, unalarming. Or at any rate one would have thought so if his great kindness of heart had not somehow shone through the rather frigid surface of his social form. He was immensely more interested in other people than in himself - though he must have known that he was undeniably one of the ornaments of his time. 


*Sketches for a composite literary portrait of Sir Edward Marsh. C. Hassall and D. Mathews. London: Lund Humphries for the Contemporary Art Society, 1953.