1

APPENDIX C Object of Insult Apocryphal and misattributed quotations and misquotations.

  As Simeon Strunsky really did write in No Mean City, “Famous remarks are seldom quoted correctly”. Acton l said something more subtle than "Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely", namely “Power tends to corrupt and

absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies

the holder of it.” It was in a letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, 3 April 1887 accompanying a review of his History of the Papacy

for the English Historical Review of which Creighton was editor. It is cited in Louise Creighton - The Life and Letters of Mandell

Creighton Vol1 Ch13 (1904); and reproduced in Acton's Essays on Freedom and Power p365, 1948. See also Brougham-2 Burke-

18 Montesquieu-5 1WPitt-1 Saint·Juste-1 WWordsworth-16.

Addison l said not "He who hesitates is lost", but “The woman that deliberates is lost”, in Cato A4 S1 L31, 1713

Aristotle l did not say Man is a political animal, in his Politics Book1 Chapter2. Aristotle used the word polis which then mean the tiny states

consisting of a town and its immediate hinterlands. So the passage is properly translated as “Man is by nature suited to city life”.

Nancy Astor l was a tireless campaigner against alcohol and was said one day to be preaching to that effect in the House of Commons saying she

would do anything rather than allow the demon drink cross her lips - “Why, I’d rather commit adultery”. To which a voice from the

back benches rejoined “And so would I”. The exchange has not been found in Hansard and some have suggested it took place at a

public meeting but it probably never happened. Some versions have attributed the exchange to a Cambridge academic E E Genner,

George Lyttleton’s letter of 9 July 1958 to Rupert Hart-Davis (The Lyttleton Hart-Davis Letters Vol3, 1981) says “I prefer the

perfectly true comment of - who was it? - who, when some teetotal ass said he would rather commit adultery than drink a glass of

port, said ‘So would we all, my dear L, so would we all’”.

Augustine l did not condemn mathematics but bogus forecasters, so he did not write De Genesi ad Litteram in which he used the word

mathematicus, in this context meaning astrologers and not mathematicians. He is therefore sometimes cited as writing {The good

Christian should beware of mathematicians and all those make empty prophecies. The danger already exists that mathematicians

have made a covenant with the devil and confine man in the bonds of hell.} For a more accurate version see Augustine-21.

Alfred Austin l was one of the poorer poets laureate but did not write "Across the wires the electric message came,/He is no better he is much the

same". Who did is not known - see 1Anon-108.

Phineas T Barnum l did not say "There's a sucker born every minute". For the theory about the true author of the words being a notorious con-man, see

Barnum-1

Beethoven l did not say "Das Land ohne Musik" of England, and neither did Felix Mendelssohn

Mrs Beeton (properly Mrs Samuel Beeton, born Mary Mayson 1836-1865)

l did not write "First catch your hare". It appears in none of her works, nor in those of a predecessor, Hannah Glasse (which may

been the pen-name of Dr John Hill 1716-1775) .though Mrs Glasse's book, The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, does contain

the phrase "Take your hare when it is cased" (skinned). For further speculation see the entry under Mrs Glasse.

Bishop George Berkeley l did not say in Essays Towards a New Theory of Vision, A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, or Three

Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonus "If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, it makes no sound." The nearest he

gets is "Surely there is nothing easier to imagine trees, for instance, in a park, or books existing in a closet, and nobody there to

perceive them"; and in the Dialogues "Can a real thing which is not audible be like a sound?". For another way of putting the notion

see RAKnox-2.

The Bible l does not say "Pride goeth before a fall". The correct quotation is "Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall"

<Proverbs 16:18>. That was slightly adapted by John Heywood as "Pride will have a fall. For pride goeth before and shame cometh

after" <Proverbs and Epigrams, 1546>

l does not say "Vengeance is mine saith the Lord". Paul's letter to the Romans 12:19 actually says "Avenge not yourselves, but rather

give place unto wrath, for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if

he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head." Presumably where it was written was in

Deuteronomy 32:35 which has "To me belongeth vengeance, and recompense", which is echoed in his letter to the Hebrews 10:30

""For we know that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord", or Psalms 94:1 which goes "O Lord

God to whom vengeance belongeth".

2

l it is not money that is the root of all evil; St Paul's letter Timothy 1Timothy 6:10 actually says "The love of money is the root of all

evil".

l does not quite say you cannot touch pitch and not be defiled - the actual words are "he that touches pitch shall be defiled therewith"

which comes from Eccelsiasticus 13:1 in the Apocrypha

l does not say the sun shines on the righteous – Matthew 5:45 has “he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth

rain on the just and on the unjust”

Bismarck l for laws and sausages see Mirabeau

Tony Blair l did not inadvertently in 2006 let slip in an interview for Al Jereeza TV channel with David Frost that Iraq war “was pretty much of

a disaster as the press widely reported it. He had merely said yes to Frost’s question about it being a disaster, and Frost was in fact

referring to the Iraqi government.

Gebhard Lebrecht von Blücher

was probably more dismissive and less envious than the common translation of his comment on London. He probably said “Was für

Plunder”. It is generally translated as: What a place to plunder, but that is correct only if Plunder had an umlaut; without it means:

What rubbish.} =viewing London from St Paul's after a peace banquet in Oxford, 1814; according to some sources from the top of

the Monument, June 1814= <cited in Evelyn, Princess Blücher – Memoirs p33, 1932> |Thackeray - The Four Georges, omitted that

umlaut but maintained it on the fur: “The bold old Reiter looked down from St Paul’s and sighed out, ‘Was für Plunder!’”.

Sometimes also rendered as: Was fur plündern, in which case it takes the umlaut and means plunder.

Humphrey Bogart l never says "Play it again, Sam." in the film Casablanca. Ingrid Bergman does say "Play it once, Sam, for old time's sake." And

when Dolley Wilson as Sam replies "I don't know what you mean, Miss Ilsa." She responds "Play it, Sam. Play 'As Time Goes By'".

Later on Bogart says "If she can stand it, I can. Play it!". All the same, Woody Allen was clearly referring to Casablanca when

entitled his own 1972 film "Play it Again Sam".

l But the line "Here's looking at you, kid" is usually accurately quoted. <script by Julius and Philip Epstein and Howard Koch>

Charles Boyer l did not whisper "Come with me to the Casbah" in suggestive French drawl to Hedy Lamarr in the film Algiers of 1938, or in any

film for that matter. According to L Swindell - Charles Boyer Ch7, 1938, "Algiers...is the picture in which Boyer did not say 'Come

wiz me to zee Casbah' to Hedy Lamarr...Boyer and Lamarr were in the Casbah in most of their Algiers scenes, and they did have an

important scene in which they were not in the Casbah, but the dialogue was nowhere close." The phrase is thought to have been

invented by the publicity department.

The Revd John Bradford l said on seeing criminals being led to execution "But for the grace of God there goes John Bradford", not as is generally commonly

quoted "There but for the grace of God go I", but either way he was thanking God prematurely since he himself suffered execution

for heresy.

John Buridan l medieval French philosopher is associated with his story of what is known as Buridan's ass: a donkey starves to death because it

cannot and has no reason to choose between two equidistant and equally tempting piles of hay. It is not in Buridan's writings,

although there are versions of it going back at least to Aristotle (see De Caelo 295b32). The earliest association of the example with

Buridan appears to be in Spinoza, Ethica II, scholium to Proposition 49. The tale may have originated as a parody of his account of

free choice, by critics who found absurd the idea that the will's freedom could consist in inaction, i.e., in its ability to defer or ‘send

back’ for further consideration any practical judgment that is not absolutely certain.

Edmund Burke l probably did not say "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing" despite the remark being

generally attributed to him. The source of that formulation has yet to be traced. Burke did have in Thoughts of the Present

Discontent, 1770, "When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice, in a

contemptible struggle", which not quite the same thing. John Stuart Mill at his inaugural address at St Andrews in 1867 said “Bad

men need nothing more to compass their ends than that good men should look on and do nothing”.

Edgar Rice Burroughs l for the unsaid "me Tarzan, you Jane" see Weismuller-1

R A Butler l did not call Anthony Eden or Harold Macmillan "the best prime minister we have". All he did was to say "yes" when a Press

Association journalist cornered him at London airport on his way to an international meeting and asked "Would you say this is the

best prime minister we have?". In later years Butler recollected the occasion in his memoirs and said "My hurried assent to this well-

meant but meaningless proposition was flashed round the world; indeed it was fathered on me. I do not think it did Anthony any

good. I did not do me any good either." Ironically, Butler himself was dubbed 'the best Prime Minister we never had' when in 1955

Churchill preferred Anthony Eden and in 1964 the ailing Harold Macmillan preferred Alec Douglas-Home as his successor.

Lord Byron l was long said to have returned the Bible sent him as a present by John Murray, his publisher, with John 18:40 altered to read ‘Now

Barabbas was a publisher’. But a later head of the publishing company, also called John Murray, in 1988 denied it, saying in

Byron’s day publishers were called booksellers, and it had in fact taken place between Coleridge and his publisher Longman. Indeed

the extant copy of Byron’s Bible has no such comment. Samuel Smiles – A Publisher and his Friends: memoir and correspondence

of the late John Murray Vol1 Ch14, 1891, attributed the event to Thomas Campbell, and was followed in the attribution by H L

Mencken in his dictionary of quotations. Considering Campbell’s feelings on the subject – see TCampbell-2 – there is a ring of

plausibility in that.

3

James Cagney l is generally parodied as saying "Ya dirty rat" but in fact he never quite said it. In the 1931 film Blonde Crazy he said "You dirty

double-crossing rat" and in Taxi of the same year he said "Come out and take it, you dirty yellow-bellied rat, or I'll give it to you

through the door". He himself confirmed this to the impersonator Frank Gorshin at an American Film Institute banquet, 13 March

1974.

James Callaghan l in a characteristically mischievous travesty, the Sun newspaper headlined the comments to journalists of prime minister James

Callaghan at London airport on 10 January 1979, as having said "Crisis? What crisis?". He was returning from a summit conference

in Guadeloupe to strikes and currency turbulence. It permanently damaged his political reputation. In fact he was asked "What is

your general approach and view of the mounting chaos in the country at the moment?" His actual reply was "Well, that's a judgment

that you are making. I promise you that if you look at it from the outside, and perhaps you are taking rather a parochial view, I don't

think that other people in the world would share the view that there is a mounting chaos." Callaghan lost the general election later

that year and David Butler - The British General Election of 1979, 1980, attributes a large part of the problem to the acceptance that

it really was what Callaghan had said. The editor of the Sun was knighted by the incoming prime minister.

l was reported in Newsweek in 1976 as saying to leader of the opposition Margaret Thatcher “Now, now, little lady, you don’t want

to believe all those things you read in the newspapers about crisis and upheavals, and the end of civilisation as we know it. Dearie

me, not at all.” In fact it was a parody of Callaghan’s patronising style by John O’Sullivan in The Daily Telegraph, 10 June 1976. It

is unlikely even Callaghan at his most avuncular would have had the gall to talk to Thatcher like that.

Pierre de Cambronne l almost certainly said "Merde, je ne me rends pas" what invited to surrender after the battle of Waterloo, rather than as quoted “La

guarde meurt et ne se rend pas. {The guard dies but does not surrender.}”

Canute l is unfairly represented as the idiot who thought he could command the tides. It is the opposite of his intention which was to impress

on his doting courtiers the severe limitation of kings' earthly powers. See Canute-1 for the clear lesson he was trying to impress on

zealous or fawning nobles.

Lewis Carroll l invented neither Tweedledum and Tweedledee, nor the Cheshire Cat. The terrible twins appeared first in a mocking 18th century

doggerel by either John Byrom, Pope or Swift mocking the London rivalry between two composers: "Some say compared to

Bononcini/That mynheer Handel's but a nini;/Others aver that he to Handel/Is scarcely fit to hold a candle./Strange all this difference

should be/Twixt Tweedledum and Tweedledee." A tweedle is a series of shrill noises.

l The satirist Peter Pindar (a pseudonym for John Wolcot) first wrote of a grin like a Cheshire cat in the late 18th century, but the

origin of the phrase is thought to be much older. Several supposed origins exist - one has it that an incompetent inn-sign painter

produced a series of lions rampant that looked like grinning moggies; another suggests that Cheshire had priviliges including

exemption from tax so its cheeses moulded in the form of cat (that part is still unexplained) had a smile on them; another version has

a Cheshire game warden called Catling under Richard III being not only viciously successful in catching poacher but turning up at

the hanging with a broad smile and hence people talked of the grin like a Cheshire Catling.

Lord Chesterfield l may have said of sex in one of his letters to his son that "The pleasure is momentary, the position ridiculous, the expense

damnable" but no record of it has been found and it is not clear how the saying came to be attributed to him, except that it is his style

of expression.

Dame Agatha Christie l is often quoted as saying "An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have: the older she gets, the more interested he is in

her". She was reported to have said this by her second husband, the archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan, on 8 March 1954, so it was

long believed and was repeated in The Observer, 2 Jan 1955. But she subsequently denied having said it, according to G C Ramsey

- Agatha Christie: mistress of mystery, 1967, saying it was a very silly remark and neither complimentary nor amusing.

Winston Churchill l strenuously denied he had ever said “an empty taxi arrived at 10 Downing Street and the door was opened Attlee got out” - see

WChurchill-61

l did not coin the phrase "iron curtain" for his Fulton speech. It has a long history and many earlier users, including himself - see

WChurchill-21.

l He also denied having said Anthony Eden used every cliche except God is love and gentlemen lift the seat, see WChurchill-3.

l Blanche Patch, Shaw’s secretary, dismissed as a journalistic invention (Michael Holroyd - Bernard Shaw Vol3, 1991) the story of

an exchange between Shaw and Churchill. Shaw was said to have sent Churchill two tickets for the first night of St Joan in 1924

with a note saying “One for yourself and the other for a friend - if you have one”. Churchill returned them with a note saying he was

busy that night but would like some tickets to the second night “if there is one”. The story has been nevertheless widely retailed

including in Pass the Port, 1976, and Peter Hay - Theatrical Anecdotes, 1987 where it is claimed to have been widely known in the

1950s. Some versions have the exchange between Noel Coward and Churchill.

l probably did not respond to Nancy Astor saying “If you were my husband I would poison your coffee” by saying “If I were your

husband I would drink it”, see WChurchill-39. It is a rather old joke which has been found at least fifty years before the exchange is

supposed to have taken place.

Karl von Clausewitz l actually wrote “Der Krieg ist nichts als eine Fortsetzung des politischen Verkehrs mit Einmischung anderer Mittel. {War is not

merely a political act but also a political instrument, war is a continuation of political relations, with the admixture of other means.}

<Vom Kriege Vol1, 1832> and was not suggesting war replaced politics - "War is the continuation of politics by other means" - as

4

generally misquoted. Chou En Lai, Chinese foreign minister, did say in 1954 {"All diplomacy is a continuation of war by other

means."}.

Coffinhal l the judge at Lavoisier’s trial, did not dismiss his request for a delayed execution to have time to finish some experiments, with

the words “la république n’a pas besoin des savants”. That was partly because in 1794 Lavoisier, who had been under arrest for

some months for being a tax farmer, was not in the middle of any scientific work.

F T D Coke l is generally credited with writing "All rowed fast but none so fast as stroke", but what he actually wrote is if anything even sillier:

“His blade struck the water a full second before any other...until, as the boats began to near the winning post his own was dipping in

the water twice as fast as any other. <Sandford of Merton Ch12, 1908>

Congreve-4 l is the correct version of what is generally quoted as "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."

Samuel Taylor Coleridge l the old sailor complains of "water, water everywhere nor any a drop to drink", instead of not a drop to drink as usually quoted

Calvin Coolidge l was noted for laconic utterances, but the tale about his comment about a noted preacher that he was against sin, is probably

apocryphal, see Coolidge-1.

l He was also reported to have objected to 1922 efforts by Britain to renegotiate war debts by saying "They hired the money, didn't

they?". His widow confirmed it was the sort of thing he would have said, but did not.

Oliver Cromwell l did not tell Sir Peter Lely to paint him "warts and all". His instructions were more elaborate than that. See OCromwell-4

Lord Curzon l did not say "Dear me, I never knew the lower classes had such white skins" after seeing soldiers bathing during World War 1, but

it stuck because it was in character. See Curzon-1

l would never have done anything so vulgar as to say aloud "My name is George Nathanial Curzon,/I am a most superior person."

Which appeared in a satirical magazine at Oxford in the 1870s, though the author is not known.

Charles Darwin l established the basis for the theory of evolution but did not coin the phrase 'survival of the fittest'. That was the work of Herbert

Spencer, see HSpencer-5 and Darwin wrote of it "The expression often used by Mr Herbert Spencer of the survival of the fittest is

more accurate and sometimes more convenient". Barry Phelps - You Don't Say! suggests Robert Service had encapsulated it most

memorably: "This is the Law of the Yukon, that only the strong shall thrive,/That surely the weak shall perish, and only the fit

survive".

John Dennis l it was said of, rather than by, him that the perpetrator of such a vile pun might well pick a pocket. See Dennis-1

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle l "Elementary, my dear Watson". Nowhere in the Doyle books does that sentence occur. The nearest to this appears in the story The

Crooked Man which is in the Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, 1894, in which comes the interchange: "'Excellent', I cried.

'Elementary', said he." In the play Sherlock Holmes which Doyle wrote with William Gillette in 1902 Holmes does exclaim

“Elementary, the child’s play of deduction.” First occurrence of the apocryphal phrase was probably in P G Wodehouse – Psmith

Journalist of 1915. The phrase occurred in the film The Return of Sherlock Holmes, 1929, in which Watson says "Amazing,

Holmes" to which Basil Rathbone as Holmes responds "Elementary, my dear Watson, elementary."

Isadora Duncan l is often credited with the final words “goodbye my friends. I go on to glory” but that seems implausible since she died of

asphyxiation when her long scarf caught round the axle of a Bugatti in which she was being driven.

Albert Einstein l did not write “astrology is a science in itself and contains an illuminating body of knowledge. It taught many things and I am

greatly indebted to it. Geophysical evidence reveals the power of the stars and planets in relation to the terrestrial. This is why

astrology is like a life-giving elixir to mankind.” It was thought to have appeared first in French in a book by the Swiss-Canadian

astrologer Werner Hirsig Manuel d’Astrologie, (about 1950) without specifying the source. It was repeated in many astrology books

subsequently. Alice Calaprice of the Princeton University Press and editor of the Einstein papers for press over 20 years (including

The Expanded Quotable Einstein) , described the quotation as wholly bogus. Einstein did not believe in astrology as is evidenced by

an authenticated quotation in his introduction to a book called Johennes Kepler: life and letters by Carola Baumgardt and referring to

Kepler’s comments — “The reader should note remarks on astrology. They show that the inner enemy conquered and rendered

innocuous, was not completely dead”.

l probably did not say “preparing a tax return is more complicated than relativity theory”, according to Alice Calaprice, editor of his

papers at the Princeton University Press. See Einstein-23

l may not have said “if the facts don’t fit theory, change the facts” — see also Einstein-11

Elizabeth I l probably did not make the grandiose speech at Tilbury about being a weak and feeble woman as it was recorded only by an

obsequious lackey, see ElizabethI-3

l her last words pleading for another moment of life, ElizabethI-5, are not recorded until several centuries after her death

W C Fields l is often quoted as having said "Any man who hates dogs and children can't be all bad" probably because it sounds very much like

his sort of sentiment. Which shows that Leo Rosten was right when made up the thought for an after-dinner speech saying it was

what he admired about W C Fields. See Rosten-1.

l He also did not compose his own epitaph: "On the whole I would rather be in Philadelphia". That was concocted for the June 1955

issue of Vanity Fair because it was known he really had said "Last week I went to Philadelphia - it was closed".

Fanny Fern l did not write "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach". What she actually wrote was “Well, it is a humiliating reflection,

that the straightest road to a man's heart is through his palate.”

5

Henry Ford l was not quite so categorical as to say "history is bunk"; see HFord-2.

l The slogan "any colour you like so long as it's black" is thought to have been invented by an advertising copywriter. The Yale

Book of Quotations reckons the autobiography (much helped by Samuel Crowther) called My Life and Work, published 1922, had

in Chapter 2 “Any customer can have a car painted any colour that he wants so long as it is black”. It is attributed to Ford in Allan

Nevins and Frank Hill – Ford 1954 Vol2 Ch15.

Nathan Bedford Forrest l Confederate general during the American civil war did not say he captured Murfreeboro because “I got there fustest with the

mostest”, as he is frequently quoted. Rather more articulately, he actually said “I just took the short cut and got there first with the

most men”, according to B Botkin - A Civil War Treasury of Tales, 1960

St Francis of Assisi l according to a former Bishop of Ripon did not pray “Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where

there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light, where there is sadness, joy. Divine Master, grant

that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in the

giving that we receive; it is pardoning that we are pardoned; it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.”

Francis I l king of France did not quite say “all is lost save honour” because he still had his life as well – see FrancisI-1

Galileo l is most unlikely to have continued to defy the Inquisition by muttering “eppur si muove” after his recantation, except in such

privacy that nobody would have been able to report it, since any other course would have meant death and he was already a broken

old man by that time — Galileo -2

Greta Garbo l maintained throughout her life she never said "I want to be alone". She insisted what she said was a repetition of her line in the

1932 film Grand Hotel in which she says "I want to be left alone".

George V l did not say with his expiring breath "How is the Empire" because he had been under sedation for several hours before he died so

his death would make the first edition of the morning papers rather than the late ones of the evening newspapers. His last words

were however "Bugger Bognor". See GeorgeV-2.

Hannah Glasse l habit maker to the Princess of Wales and author of the book The Art of Cookery, 1747, never did write “first catch your hare”. The

nearest she gets is in Chapter 1 where she says “Take your hare when it is cased”. Despite dismissing the attribution as a myth, a

1990s edition of Mrs Glasse’s book was entitled First Catch Your Hare: the art of cookery made plain and easy. On theory is that the

phrase is a distortion of “it is commonly said you must first catch your deer, when it is caught, skin it” which comes from De

Legibus et Consuetinibus Angliae {On the Laws and Customs of England} by the 13thC jurist Henry de Bracton. Some scholars

suggest a more recent origin. In Thackeray’s The Rose and the Ring, 1855, there is “’A soldier, Prince, must needs obey his orders:

mine are...to seize wherever I should light upon him ‘ ‘First catch your hare!’ edxclaimed his Royal Highness.” And The Times of

25 August 1858 had “Bitter experience has taught us not to cook our hare before we caught it.” Both are well before Mrs Beeton’s

Book of Household Management, to which the phrase has also been misattributed, since that appeared in parts from 1859 to 1861

and then in book form. On the other hand that might also suggest the phrase was an old proverb, a variant on counting one’s

chickens.

Sam Goldwyn l had so many bogus quotations attributed to him, even in his lifetime, that he once burst out "Goldwynisms! Don't talk to me about

Goldwynisms. You want to hear some Goldwynisms, go talk to Jesse Lasky" (a film producer), according to Robert Hendrickson -

The Literary Life,

l He did not say "I can answer that in two words im-possible" according to Alva Johnson - The Great Goldwyn Ch1, 1937. Samuel

Goldwyn Jr also had doubts about its authenticity. The first recorded occurrence of the saying is in a 1925 humorous magazine

where it was attributed to Potash or Perlmutter. But Scott A Berg - Goldwyn, 1990 quotes Charlie Chaplin taking credit for having

invented the saying.

l ”I’ll give you a definite maybe” is often attributed to Goldwyn (eg Evan Esar – The Humour of Humour (1954) but is so old as

almost to have become cliche

l He also did not repeat the old chestnut "Our comedies are not to be laughed at".

l "Never let that sonofabitch into this office again - until we need him" has been attributed to most of the old-time Hollywood

moguls including Louis B Mayer, Harry Cohn, as well as Goldwyn.

l It is also untrue that when he wanted to buy Lillian Hellman's play The Children's Hour somebody said "Forget it. It's about

lesbians" and he retorted "That's all right we'll make them Americans" (or, according to another version, “OK, we’ll make them

Albanians”. This was cited in Edward Fuller - 2500 Anecdotes for all Occaions, 1943, but referring to Radclyffe Hall’s Well of

Loneliness, with the response “All right- where they got lesbians we’ll use Austrians”. It was also cited by Philip French in The

Observer newspaper 10 May 1992. Goldwyn did in fact make The Children’s Hour into a film as These Three, but without any of

the lesbianism.

l "I read part of it all the way through" (Alva Johnson – The Great Goldwyn , 1937) is also apocryphal.

l “What we want is a story that starts with an earthquake and works its way up to a climax” was cited as a Goldwynism in The

Times, 18 Sept 1985, but was also attributed to Cecil B de Mille in John Robert Colombo - The Wit and Wisdom of the

Moviemakers, 1979.

6

l When told a script was too caustic he did not respond "To hell with the cost. If it's a good story I'll make it", cited in Zierold –

Moguls, (1969)

l "Anyone who would go to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined" is cited as a Goldwynism in The New York Herald

Tribune, 26 Dec 1948, and in Norman Zierold - Moguls Ch3, 1969. It has been attributed to several people including Lillian

Hellman but goes back to the unexplored earliest days of psychiatry.

l After the making of Thurber's Walter Mitty he did not cable the author with "I am very sorry you thought I was too blood and

thirsty" and Thurber did not reply "Not only did I think so but I was horror and struck".

l "A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on" (sometimes quoted as "A gentlemen's agreement...") is quoted in Alva

Johnston - The Great Goldwyn Ch1, 1937 and A Scott Berg - Goldwyn, 1989, but is in fact a slight improvement on his comment on

the unusually honest Joseph M Schwenck "His verbal contract is worth more than the paper it's printed on", which is attested by

Carol Easton - The Search for Sam Goldwyn, 1976. His son said he probably actually did say it. If so it was far from original. J C

Percy - Bulls Ancient and Modern quotes “Verbal agreements, said the Irish attorney, are not worth the paper they are written on”.

l Almost certainly apocryphal is his response to a secretary who suggested destroying files more than six years old: “Certainly, but

be sure to make copies”.

l "Gentlemen, include me out" is of uncertain authenticity. It is cited in Alva Johnson – The Great Goldwyn and A Scott Berg -

Goldwyn, 1989. According to Michael Freedland - The Goldwyn Touch he said it when resigning at a meeting of the Motion

Picture Producers and Distributors of America in October 1933, though other reports had the rather less eccentric "Gentlemen I'm

withdrawing from the association". Another tale had it said in an argument with Jack Warner over who Busby Berkeley was

supposed to be working for. But Goldwyn himself later denied it. However at Balliol College in Oxford he said on 1 March 1945

"For years I have been known for saying 'include me out', but today I am giving it up for ever".

l “I had a great idea this morning, but I didn’t like it” is doubted.

l It is thought unlikely he said of Louis B Mayer "The reason so many people turned up at his funeral was because they wanted to

make sure he was dead". It was cited in Bosley Crowther - Hollywood Rajah, 1960, but apart from other contrary indications there

were few people at Mayer's funeral. Similarly, he did not say of the burial "As I always say, give people what they want and they'll

turn out to see it". Both have been widely attributed to the well-attended funerals of several Hollywood moguls. Goldwyn was not

invited to the funeral, and did not go. His son recounts that although he disliked Mayer he was actually deeply moved on the day.

That did not stop George Jessel appropriating the aphorism at the time film producer Harry Cohn was buried in 1958, see Jessel-1.

l The dismissal of films with a message - "Messages are for Western Union" was attested by Arthur Marx - Goldwyn, 1976, by

which time it was already in books of quotations. But Jack Warner is also supposed to have said "We'll make the pictures; let

Western Union deliver the messages".

l The is comment is doubted about his film The Best Years of Our Lives, “I don’t care if it doesn’t make a nickel. I just want every

man, woman and child in America to see it.”

l Possibly did not say “We’re overpaying him but he’s worth it”.

l His dying words were not "I never thought I'd live to see the day". According to Robert Hendrickson - The Literary Life Clifton

Fadiman owned up to inventing the exit line.

l "Now why did you name your baby John? Every Tom, Dick and Harry is named John" is wholly unauthenticated and very

probably bogus.

l "We have all passed a lot of water since then" is cited in E Goldman - The Fifty Year Decline of Hollywood, 1961, but is almost

certainly apocryphal.

l ”It rolls off my back like a duck” is once again in Alva Johnson – The Great Goldwyn but is reckoned apocryphal

l "It's more than magnificent - it's mediocre" is almost certainly apocryphal

l The authenticity of his question “Tell me, how did you love my picture” is doubted.

Hermann Göring l did not say "When I hear the word culture I reach for my gun". In fact nobody did. The German playwright Hanns Johst (1890-

1978) has a character in Schlageter who says "Wenn ich Kultur höre...entsichere ich meinen Browning" {When I heard the word

culture I take the safety catch off my Browning}, see Johst-1. But the original phrase has so much passed into common culture that

satirist were able to say of Hemingway that when reached for his gun he heard the word culture.

l did not say "guns before butter" and neither did Goebbels. What they did say came to much the same thing however - see

Goebbels-3 Göring-3

Lew Grade (Lord Grade) l has been credited with malapropisms and sayings similar to Sam Goldwyn’s and most are equally apocryphal. For instance he

almost certainly did not respond to a child asking what two and two made with “Are you buying or selling?”.

l he also denied having lamented the huge cost of making the film Raising the Titanic by saying “it would have been cheaper to

lower the Atlantic”. He may have said “I didn’t raise the Titanic high enough”.

Gus Hall (1910-), leader of the American Communist Party

l did not say, as anti-Communist propaganda widely reported him, "I dream of the hour when the last Congressman is strangled to

death on the guts of the last preacher".

7

Denis Healey l When Labour shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, was reported in The Times of 2 Oct 1973 as having said at the Labour Party

conference that he would "squeeze the rich until the pips squeak". But in his autobiography The Time of My Life, 1990, he denied it

saying only there would be howls of anguish from the 80,000 people having to pay 75% tax on the last slice of their income. "I

never said...I would 'squeeze the rich until the pips squeak', though I did quote Tony Crosland using this phrase of Lloyd George's in

reference to property speculators, not the rich in general". That Lloyd George reference has not been identified, Geddes did repeat

his intention to wreak vengeance on Germany for the first world war: "The Germans, if this government is returned, are going to pay

every penny. They are going to be squeezed as the lemon is squeezed - until the pips squeak". See Geddes-1

Henry II l of England almost certainly did not say of Becket “will no one rid me of this turbulent priest” (as reported by G Lyttleton - History

of the Life of King Henry II part4, 1769) but more likely said “what miserable drones and traitors have I nourished and brought up

in my household who allow their lord to be treated with such shameful contempt by a low-born cleric”. Less of a direct invitation to

murder, but apparently with the same effect.

Patrick Henry l may well not have said "I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death" at Virginia

Assembly, 20 March 1775. The first recorded mention of this ringing declamation is in William Wirt - Patrick Henry, 1818 though

the author had not been present and had never spoken to Henry.

l "If this be treason, make the most of it.” is also now widely believed to have been the fruit of the biographer’s enthusiasm.

Adolf Hitler l did not invent the notion of lebensraum - space for a state to expand - but took it from Karl Haushofer, who in turn had got it from

the geopolitics of Swedish geographer Rudolph Kjellen, who had developed the idea from the German Friederich Ratzel's theory

that a country must either grow or die.

Thomas Hobbes l is often misinterpreted by being made to say that "the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short". In fact he was saying no

such thing The quotation is only part of a long passage and omitting the rest is misleading.. He was specifically pointing out the

advantages of life within a social organisation, because outside it "men live without other security than what their own strength and

their own invention shall furnish them"

Victor Hugo l is probably the originator of "No army can withstand the idea whose time has come. But what he actually wrote in Histoire d'un

Crime conclusion Ch10, 1852 published 1877, was "On résiste à l'invasion des armées; on ne résiste pas a l'invasion des idées. {One

resists the invasion by armies; one does not resist the invasion of ideas.} It is sometimes misquoted as "Greater than the tread of

mighty armies is an idea whose hour has come".

Thomas Jefferson l did not say the price of liberty is eternal vigilance. Neither did Wendell Phillips, the American campaigner for the abolition of

slavery - he said it the other way round: "eternal vigilance is the price of liberty". But all the cliched variants subsequently produced

ignored the actual wording. For instance Arnold Bennett said "the price of justice is eternal publicity".

John Paul Jones, the Scots sailor who fought in the French, American and Russian navies

l is reported to have been in charge of three French ships engaging two British ships off Flamborough Head on the Yorkshire Coast.

His own ship, the Bonhomme Richard, began to sink and with the normal courtesies of the day the British admiral on board the

Serapis, or Captain Richard Pearson, offered to help if he had stopped fighting. But in response to the British signal Jones is said to

have replied "I have not yet begun to fight", according to a later recollection of Lieutenant Richard Dale. This tale prompted the

American writer Richard Armour - It All Started with Columbus, to comment Jones was a good man but slow to anger. In fact there

is no contemporary record of such a signal, not even in his own record of the battle, according to Anna Farwell de Koven - Life and

Letters of John Paul Jones Vol1, 1913. Indeed Jones himself claimed he had responded "I have not yet thought of it, but am

determined to make your strike" (ie strike the colours: surrender).

Joseph II of Austria l did not say Die Entführung aus dem Serail was too noisy or that it had too many notes. He was in fact more humble and more

moderate in his comment after the first performance - see JosephII-1

Benjamin Jowett, master of Balliol,

l did not write or say "First come I; my name is Jowett./There's no knowledge but I know it./I am Master of this college:/What I

don't know isn't knowledge." That appeared in the Oxford Masque of the 1870s and is thought to be by H C Beeching (1859-1919).

George S Kaufman l did not comment that “I saw the play at a disadvantage. The curtain was up.” It was Groucho Marx in an interview with Walter

Winchell but he mischievously attributed it to Kaufman and that is the way Winchell printed it. After about five years Groucho

owned up and is recorded as the originator by Peter Hay in Broadway Anecdotes, 1989.

Søren Kierkegaard l did not quite say, as John Mortimer quoted him in an epigraph for his novel Paradise Portponed, Life must be lived forwards, but it

can only be understood backwards. His is less pithy version at Kirkegaard-6

Philip King l in his farce play See How They Run, did not have the line Sergeant, arrest several of these vicars, which Tom Stoppard has

suggested is one of the funniest lines in any English farce. The actual line is a rather less comic “Sergeant, arrest most of these

people”.

Captain Kirk, leader of the Starship Enterprise in the television series Star Trek

l never said "Beam me up Scotty"

Lenin l has been credited with many sayings for which no record was subsequently found. John Maynard Keynes - The Economic

Consequences of the Peace, 1919 says Lenin is said to have declared that "the best way to destroy capitalism is to debauch the

8

currency. By a continuing process of inflation, government can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth

of their citizens." Keynes comments it is right as "there is no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch

the currency". Unfortunately he does not give the source of his quotation and no other record has ever been found.

l "The capitalist will sell us the rope with which to hang them" has not been found in any writing or speech.

l Apart from the attribution by the Webbs there is no record of Lenin having said "It is true that liberty is precious - so precious it

must be rationed", see Lenin-1

Abraham Lincoln l for his attributed comments on God liking the common people, which seems to have been created by other people’s dreams, see

Lincoln-9

l did not say or write "You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the

strong. You cannot help the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by

encouraging class hatred. You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.

You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn. You cannot build character and courage by taking away man's

initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.”

|According to Roy Basler in Abraham Lincoln Quarterly, Dec 1949, this quotation was first created for a 1942 leaflet distributed by

the Committee for Constitutional Government. Albert A Woldman - Harper's Magazine, May 1950, said the quotation came from

The Industrial decalogue pamphlet published in 1911 by the Reverend William J H Boetcker. Calvin Coolidge said "Don't expect to

build up the weak by pulling down the strong" in a speech at Massachusetts State Senate, 7 Jan 1914. Lincoln may well have said

"That some should be rich shows that others may become rich and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise". It is

nevertheless included as Lincoln-10 because the fact that is inauthentic refuses to take root in the public consciousness.

l He was also not the first to talk of fooling some of the people some of the time and so on. See Lincoln-2.

l Did not say “The ballot is stronger than the bullet”. In a speech of 18 May 1953, cited in R P Basler (ed) – Collected Works of

Abraham Lincoln Vol2 (1953), he said “To give victory to the right, not bloody bullets, but peaceful ballots, are necessary”.

Louis XIV l was a little more wordy than the attributed but almost certainly bogus "L'état c'est moi". What he said was "La nation ne fait pas

corps en France: elle réside tout entière dans la personne du roi". {The nation is not a corporate entity in France; it exists completely

in the person of the king.}

l is credited with saying “Il n'y a plus de Pyrennées”, on the accession of his grandson the Duc d'Anjou to the throne of Spain, by

Voltaire - Le Siecle de Louis XIV Ch28. Sir Winston Churchill in his The Age of Revolution, 1957, however says "On November

16 a famous scene was enacted at Versailles. Louis XIV, at his levée, presented the Spanish ambassador to the Duke of Anjou,

saying, 'You may salute him as your king'. The ambassador gave vent to his celebrated indiscretion, 'There are no more Pyrennees'."

Sir Winston was probably drawing on the diary of the Marquis de Dangeau.

Martin Luther l has been frequently quoted as saying “Who does not love wine, woman and song/Remains a fool his whole life long” without a

scrap of evidence. And the attribution was made first in 1775, 230 years after his death. In fact there are several versions of similar

proverbs in Latin and German but no indication Luther ever quoted any of them.

Harold Macmillan l did not say “events, dear boy, events” when asked what were the greatest problems for government. He may have said something

like “the opposition of events”.

George Mallory l almost certainly never said he was set on climbing Everest “because it’s there” as such flip remarks were not really his style - see

Mallory-1

Sir Thomas Mallory l suggested in his tale Le Morte d’Arthur, written 1469-1470, the epitaph on king Arthur’s tomb was Hic jacet Arthurus, rex

quondam rexque futurus. {Here lies Arthur, the once and future king.} which provided a title for T H White’s tetralogy of the

period. But even if Arthur actually did exist in the 6thC, which is widely doubted, the notice in Glastonbury Abbey claiming to mark

the site of his tomb has no such inscription.

Marie Antoinette l never did say “let them eat cake” when told the French peasant were rioting because they did not have enough bread. She did not

mention brioche either – the original quotations being “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche”. The French had been attributing such

unfeeling attitudes to every foreign queen since at least 1670 when Maria Theresa married Louis XIV. The remark has also been

attributed to Marie-Therese wife of Louis XIV and to other 18thC ladies, but it was probably just propaganda. The revolutionaries

are thought to have emphasised the attribution to Marie Antoinette to stir up public disgust. In fact, at the time of her coronation –

around the time she is accused of having made the remark – she actually wrote of the poor “we are more obliged than ever to work

hard for their happiness”.

Milton l did not write "fresh fields and pastures new". In Lycidas 1 line 192 what he actually wrote was "At last he rose, and twitch'd his

mantle blue;/To-morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new."

Mirabeau l on no evidence is supposed to have said {Laws are like sausages: you should never watch them being made.} The thought has also

been attributed to Bismarck, though also without any evidence, in the form {If you like laws and sausages you should never watch

either being made.} or {To retain respect for laws and sausages one must not watch them being made.}

Montgomery l "Consider what the Lord said to Moses - and I think he was right" may have been in character but was actually said by Lance

Percival in Montgomery's voice on a BBC television programme That Was the Week That Was in about 1962. Archbishop of

9

Canterbury Donald Coggan did however preach in St Paul's Cathedral on the Queen's Silver Jubilee, 7 June 1977, on St Matthew

7:24: "We listened to these words of Jesus a few moments ago. How right he was." According to the Oxford Book of Oxford (edited

by Jan Morris) William Jackson, Bishop of Oxford, once preached "St Paul says in one of his epistles, and I partly agree with him..."

But see also Mortimer-10.

S F B Morse l did not invent the telegraph; that was the work of Professor Joseph Henry of Princeton; but Morse patented it first. The world's first

telegraph message down the wire from Washington to Baltimore was not in fact "What God hath wrought", because before that the

wire had already carried the signal "Everything worked well".

Sir Charles Napier l did not send the message “Peccavi” as a cryptic signal indicating “I have Sind”. It was a sixteen year old schoolgirl Catherine

Winkworth who dreamt up the joke and sent it in to Punch which used it on 13 May 1844.

Napoleon l may well have said "L'Angleterre est une nation de boutiquiers", but he was certainly not the first with the phrase as he was beaten

to it by two Englishmen JTucker-1 and ASmith-7, as well as a Frenchman Barere-1.

l He is also but one many to have noticed God favours the stronger army. Though variously phrased the sentiment is much the same

- see Anouilh-1Boileau·Despraux-1 Bussy·Rabutin-1 FrederickII-1 Gibbon-20 Sevigne-1 Tacitus-6 Voltaire-16 Zeller-1

l Similarly, he was echoing over a century of opprobrium in his reference to "La perfide Albion".

l almost certainly did not say “Not tonight Josephine” because he was too busy or unable to satisfy her notorious appetites. It is

thought to have been invented in the 19thC and has been popularised in films and plays.

Horatio Nelson l probably did say "Kiss me Hardy” but not as his last words. While dying on board his ship he first asked his flag captain not to

throw him overboard. Then he asked them to look after “poor Lady Hamilton”. After that he said the famous words and Captain

Hardy kissed him on the cheek to which Nelson responded “Now I am satisfied” which prompted Hardy to kiss him on the forehead

to which Nelson said “Who is that?”. When he recognised the man he said “God bless you, Hardy”. Shortly after that Nelson said

“Thank God I have done my duty” and then “Drink, drink, fan, fan, rub, rub”, because he was hot, thirsty and in pain – his steward

was giving him lemonade and watered wine, and fanning him, and the ship’s chaplain Dr Scott was massaging his chest to ease the

pain.

Sir Isaac Newton l did say he saw farther because he stood on the shoulders of giants, Newton-1, but he was echoing similar thoughts by others:

BernardofChartres-1 RobtBurton-6 Lucan-1

The Caliph Omar (581-644), one of Mohammed's fathers in law and a wide-ranging conquering general

l probably did not order the destruction of the library on his entry into Alexandria in 640 or 641 with the words "All that men need to

know is in this book, the holy Koran" nor that “If these writings agree with the book of God they are useless and need not be

preserved; if they disagree, they are pernicious and ought to be destroyed”, as reported by Edward Gibbon - The Decline and Fall of

the Roman Empire. One reason is that the library, which had been built around 295BC by the Athenian exile Demetrius of Phalaron

under the patronage of Ptolemy I, with an annexe set up 60 years later under Ptolemy II, had already been burnt several times. It had

accumulated about 700,000 papyrus scrolls, when about a tenth of it was burnt during the invasion by the Romans under Julius

Caesar in 48-47 BC as part of the Roman civil war. It was restored by Cleopatra and continued to expand until 273AD when the

Romans under Aurelian destroyed a part of it again. A few years later Diocletian sacked the city and further damage was inflicted. In

around 390 the emperor Theodosius destroyed the Serapeum annexe and encouraged the pillaging of the books by Christians. The

library was sacked by the mobs around 420 with only a few things surviving in the Serapeum cellars. For instance of 123 plays by

Sophocles just seven remained; mathematical works by Archimedes were lost as was three-quarters of Livy’s History of Rome; also

lost was an eight-volume treatise on Guide to Geography by Ptolemy of Alexandria written in the 2ndC which included references

by latitude and longitude, map projections, and the assumption the world was round. By the time Omar arrived there would not have

been enough left to fuel the furnaces of the baths for six months as the tale relates. The story was first written down six centuries

later by Abul-Fragius, Bishop of Aleppo.

George Orwell l there is no record of him having said or written “People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready

to do violence on their behalf”, or the alternative version “We sleep safely at night because rough men stand ready to visit violence

on those who would harm us”. The nearest he got was in a piece of Rudyard Kipling written in 1942: “He sees clearly that men can

only be highly civilised while other man, inevitably less civilised, are there to guard and feed them”, which is not the same thing.

James Otis's l ringing declaration "taxation without representation is tyranny" improved in the sixty years of retelling the story, and what if

anything he originally said is merely conjecture. See Otis-1. In any case the franchise was tightly restricted in America as in Britain,

and the burden of taxation on the colonists was about a fiftieth of that on Britons.

Dorothy Parker l may have responded from honeymoon to being pressed for a promised article: "too fucking busy and vice versa". Her biographer

reports it but is doubtful, and there is no evidence either way. (see DParker-4) John Keats - You Might As Well Live (1979)

l is said to have arrived at the door of a restaurant at the same time as Clare Booth Luce who stepped aside, saying “Age before

beauty”. To which Parker is said to have responded “Pearls before swine” and went in. The exchange was reported by Bennett Cerf

– Try and Stop Me, 1944 but Clare Booth Luce denied it and Dorothy Parker’s biographer John Keats doubted its authenticity.

St Paul l was not so much against money, as the insistence on getting it. See 2Bible-13

10

Pierre Perignon l the Franciscan monk, 16401-1715, was not responsible for the much-publicised exclamation of “Come quickly, I am drinking the

stars”. It was invented for an advertisement in the late 19thC. The fizz was not even his discovery – it had been around since

fermentation, and the start of champagne came from Britain. Fermentation normally stops when the alcohol strength of 9 to 15%

kills off the yeast cells, but cold weather sometimes suspends it temporarily. In France the wine was stored in barrels so when the

spring thaw restarted the process the carbon dioxide just leaked away. But in England the wine had been bottled so the CO2 from

restarted fermentation stayed in the bottle. Records of the Royal Society show the system was recorded in 1662.

Boscoe Pertwee l the 18thC poet did not say “I used to be indecisive but now I’m not so sure”, because he did not exist. He was invented by a group

of Hampshire friends who sent the quotation in to BBC Radio 4 programme Quote Unquote, the presenter of which, Nigel Rees,

read it out on air and included it in a book of the programme. It subsequently appeared R L Gregory – Mind and Science and

Umberto Eco’s- Kant and the Platypus in the introduction. The thought was in fact a graffito spotted by the friends, one of whom, M

M Harvey, confessed the imposture which was exposed in N Rees – Brewer’s Famous Quotations, 2009

Marshal Petain l did not say "Ils ne passeront pas". It was General Nivelle.

Petronius l almost certainly did not express the cynical views on perpetual reorganisation attributed him: {We trained hard but it seemed that

every time we were beginning to form up into teams, we would be reorganised. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any

new situation by reorganising, and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion,

inefficiency and demoralisation.} |This was thought to have come from Satyricon but has not been identified in any of the available

versions. It appeared in David Willings – The Human Element in Management, 1968 and part of the quotation was cited by Robert

Townsend – Up the Organisation, 1970. A contributor to the Petronian Society Newsletter, May 1981, said the sentiment purporting

to be a quotation had been pinned “to a bulletin board in one of the camps of the armies occupying Germany sometime after 1945

(the style suggests a British occupying force). Since the sentiment is impeccable, whether applied to military, governmental or

academic administration, it has enjoyed a cachet borrowed from Petronius ever since”. So it almost certainly bogus. The

disgruntlement has sometimes been attributed to Tacitus but with similar lack of evidence.

Pablo Picasso l did not say “I am only a public entertainer who has understood his time” as cited in Quick Magazine, summer 1951. According to

a letter from William S Rubin in the New York Times, 5 January 1969, the remark is “a trumpery originated in Il Libero Nero

published by Giovanni Papini in 1851”.

William Pitt the Younger l had a large number of alternative last words, most of them implausible. See 2WPitt-5

Pliny l was the originator of "in vino veritas" but not in these words. He actually said "Vulgoque veritas iam attributa vino est" (Pliny-3)

Madame de Pompadour l if she said “après nous le déluge”, she was almost certainly quoting; see Pompadour-1

Dan Quayle (1947-) l made a substantial number of boobs while vice-president but did not says on a trip round Latin America "I wish I'd studied Latin at

school so I could talk to you in your own language". Democratic Congresswoman Pat Schroeder publicly apologised for inventing

that one.

Ronald Reagan l remarked to his wife after being shot "Honey, I forgot to duck" which showed admirable sang froid but was a quote from Jack

Dempsey to his wife after being beaten in the world heavyweight boxing championship by Gene Tunney, 23 Sept 1926, and cited in

Jack Dempsey - The Name's Dempsey (1977).

Auguste Renoir l is sometimes alleged to have said {I paint with my prick}. That is probably derived as a corollary from what he did say: {It is with

my brush that I make love}, as cited by A André – Renoir, 1915.

Paul Revere l did not ride all over New England shouting “The British are coming” as a warning of approaching troops. As far as can be

discerned the tale first appeared in the Washington Post, 10 March 1907. For a start, the colonists considered themselves to be

British, so if he had been shouting anything it would more likely have been “the regulars are coming”, but there is no reliable

evidence for that either.

Rhodes-5 l is the correct version of what is often quoted as "So much to do so little time to do it in."

Duc de Richelieu (1585-1642)

l probably did not say “Qu’on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j’y trouverai do quoi le faire pendre.”

{If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man I will something there to hang him.} as attributed by Edouard

Fournier – L’Esprit dans l’Histoire: recherches at curiosités sur les mots historiques, 1857. Othon Guerlac – Les Citations Francaises

quotes the 18thC Memoires de Mme de Motteville attributing to Richelieu {With two lines of writing by a man one can idnct the

most innocent} only to deny its authenticity and crediting the saying to the judge Laubardement.|

Franklin Delano Roosevelt l is generally credited with having said something like the only thing to fear is fear itself. In fact the thought has been echoed down

the centuries - see Bacon-18 Montaigne-9 FDRoosevelt-2 Thoreau-9 Wellington-10.

Seattle (c1784-1866), chief of Dwamish, Suquamish and allied red Indian tribes

l did not write a letter to President Franklin Pierce in 1854: "We do not understand when the buffalo are all slaughtered, the wild

horses are tamed, the secret corners of the forest heavy with the scent of many men, and the view of the ripe hill blotted by trailing

wires. Where is the thicket? Gone. Where is the eagle? Gone. The end of living and the beginning of survival." It also said "How can

you buy or sell the sky, the warmth of the land? The idea is strange to us. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of

the water, how can you buy them? Every part of the earth is sacred to my people." It was reproduced, together with a pleas that his

11

name should die with him following of the ceding of territories in Washington state, in Brother Eagle, Sister Sky: a message from

chief Seattle, 1990, but within two years was exposed as the creation of television scriptwriter Ted Perry for a 1971 historical film.

Ernest Shackleton l probably did not place a small advertisement in The Times in 1900 saying “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter

cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success.” The first

mention of this was in L Watkins - The Hundred Greatest Advertisements, 1949, who suggested Shackleton said "It seemed as

though all the men in Great Britain were determined to accompany me, the response was so overwhelming". Shackleton’s

biographer Roland Huntford doubts there was a need to advertise for companions and a search of the newspaper’s digitised archives

failed to find the advertisement.

Shakespeare l in the Merchant of Venice wrote "all that glisters is not gold", often misquoted as glitters. Incidentally, the thought had occurred

before; for instance to the poet John Lydgate, c1370-c1451, who wrote in As a Mydsomer Rose “all is not golde that outward

showith bright”.

l wrote “to gild refined gold, to paint the lily” <King John A4 S2 L11> as Byron almost correctly quoted in Don JuanCanto3

Stanza76: “But Shakespeare also says, ’tis very silly ‘To gild refined gold, or paint the lily’.” It is usually misquoted as “gild the

lily”.

l did not write, a poor thing but my own; he wrote “an ill-favoured thing but mine own” <As You Like It A5 S4 L60>

l Hamlet says “Alas! poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio” not, as is so often quoted “Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him well”.

G B Shaw l No record has been found of Shaw saying or writing “England and America are two countries separated by the same language”,

sometimes quoted as a “common language”. It was cited in Readers Digest: picturesque speech and patter, Nov 1942. Oscar Wilde

did have “We really have everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language.” It appeared in Court and

Society Review, 23 Feb and 2 March 1887, and was reprinted as The Canterville Ghost Ch1, 1887. Bertrand Russell - Saturday

Evening Post, 3 June 1944, had: “It is a misfortune for Anglo-American friendship that the two countries are supposed to have a

common language”. Dylan Thomas in a radio talk reproduced in The Listener, April 1954, talked of writers and scholars on either

side of the Atlantic being “up against the barrier of a common language”. The Times, 26 Jan 1987, and The European newspaper 22

Nov 1991, questionably attributed the saying to Sir Winston Churchill in the form "our two countries are divided by a common

language".

William Tecumseh Sherman, American Civil War general

l did not say "War is hell" in those words. But that is merely a slight misquotation. See WTSherman-1

Simonedes l may well not have written the epitaph on the Spartans killed in the defensive rearguard battle at Thermopylae: W xein aggeilon

akedaimonioiz oti thde keimeqa toiz keinwn rhmasi peiqomenoi. {Go tell the Spartans, you who passes by,/That here obedient to

their laws we lie.} Herodotus - Histories Bk7 Ch228 mentions the epitaph but not as by being by him, whereas later in the same

paragraph he does specify Simonides wrote the epitaph for Leonidas’ prophet. That silence may suggest Simonides did not write it.

Socrates l has often been quoted as saying “Children now love luxury, they have bad manners, contempt for authority, they show disrespect

for their elders and love chatter rather than exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants, of their households. They no longer

rise when their elders enter a room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up the best parts at dinner, cross

their legs and tyrannise their elders”. This is said to show that old men have always thought times were deteriorating and youth was

less disciplined than in their young days, which may well be true but no such sentiments have been found in anything Plato or

anyone else wrote about Socrates.

Solon l is unlikely to have warned Croesus {Call no man happy until he is dead, he is at best lucky.} as the most reliable dates suggest he

was dead some years before Croesus ascended the throne and asked him to nominate the happiest man in the world. But as Plutarch

pointed out it is the sort of thing Solon might well have said.

Revd William Spooner l perpetrated relatively few authenticated metatheses. Almost certainly fake is "You have tasted two worms, you have hissed my

mystery lectures and you must leave by the first town drain", although it was cited in the Oxford University What's What, 1948,

apparently in the belief it was genuine.

l The toast to "our queer old Dean" is doubted.

l Julian Huxley - Memories, 1970, quoted "the minx by spoonlight the most remarkable sight in Egypt", but that is reckoned

inauthentic.

l "It popped on its little drawers" of a cat falling from the window was quoted in William Hayter - Spooner, 1977 but is doubted.

l "The Lord is a shoving leopard" is possibly genuine, as is "darken our lightness, we beseech Thee o Lord", and "through a dark

glassly" is currently also believed.

l The announcement of the next hymn in New College chapel in 1879 as “Kinquering congs their titles take”, was certainly reported

in his lifetime in the Oxford Echo of 4 May 1892 and Hayter thought it may have been genuine

l ”Which of us has not felt in his heart a half-warmed fish?” was cited by G K Chesterton in Hearsts’s Magazine, Dec 1913 but

attributed it to just a don and is reckoned inauthentic.

l ”Through a dark glassly” was described by Hayter as more plausible than most

12

l Not a metathesis but an absent-minded remark to an undergraduate in 1918 “Now, tell me, was it you or your brother who was

killed in the war?” was widely reported but Frank Muir – Oxford Book of Humorous Prose cites a 1630 book John Taylor – Wit and

Mirth: “A nobleman as he was riding met with a yeoman of the country …’I remember thee better now’ saith my lord, ‘There were

two brothers but one is dead, which of you doth remain alive?’” So an old tale may have been just reattributed to a popular target –

as happened with Goldwyn and Dorothy Parker.

Madame de Staël l was not quite so sweeping as to say "Tout comprendre, c'est tout pardonner" - see Stael-3

Willie 'The Actor' Sutton, the American bank robber

l may not have said he robbed banks because that is where the money is. It is now thought a journalist concocted the line and

attributed it to him. See Sutton-1

Tacitus l for the disgruntled cynicism about management, often also attributed to Petronius, see Petronius

Norman Tebbitt l said when his father was thrown out of work during the Great Depression he “got on his bike and looked for work”, rather than the

terse injunction of “on yer bike” with which he has been generally credited ever since.

Sophie Tucker l there is no contemporary record of her saying "I've been rich and I've been poor, and rich is better" or any slight variants of it. See

STucker-2.

Queen Victoria l was not given to riotous hilarity but her magisterial reproof "We are not amused" is not attested by very solid evidence. It occurs in

Arthur Beavan - Popular Royalty (1897), Anonymous - Notebooks of a Spinster Lady 1887-1907 (1919). The rebuke was reputed to

have been directed at Admiral Maxse for a risqué story, but his daughter said he had never met the queen. J A Fuller Maitland - A

Doorkeeper of Music said the object of the complaint was the Hon Alexander Yorke after Victoria heard him do an impersonation of

herself.

l did not object to the inclusion of women in the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885 outlawing homosexuality. She did not say “No

woman would do that”, nor “Why were women included in the Act as it is surely impossible for them”. The reason was that women

were never included in any part or draft of the Act, but had only the phrase “any male person…”. Nor, in the absence of any mention

of women, did she ask why.

Voltaire l did not say "I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it", though he did say some similar things

in a letter to le Riche. See Voltaire-14

George Washington l almost certainly did not say “Father, I cannot tell a lie. I did it with my little hatchet” when confronted with the dead cherry tree. It

was probably invented by Mason Locke Weems - The Life of George Washington: with curious anecdotes, equally honourable to

himself and exemplary to his young countrymen/Life and Memorable Actions of George Washington Ch1 1800. Parson Weems

(actually he was just a Bible salesman) claimed to have heard the tale twenty years earlier of George Washington's childhood

confession from an old woman who was a distant relative of Washington's. See GWashington-4.

Thomas John Watson l when chairman of IBM, is alleged to have said “I think there is a world market for about five computers” and is so cited in Chris

Morgan and David Langford - Facts and Fallacies, 1981. What Watson said at a 1953 shareholders’ meeting where he was talking

about the company’s 701 expensive scientific computer is sometimes thought to have been the origin of this, according got he

company, when he said he had expected to get five orders but actually got eighteen.

John Wayne l never did say "A man's got to do what a man's got to do" in any of his films. In Hondo (1953) - script by James Edward Grant from

a story by Louis Lamour - he did say "A man ought to do what he thinks is right". Alan Ladd in the eponymous part of Shane (1953)

- scripted by A B Guthrie - said "A man has to be what he is, Joey", and "I couldn't do what I gotta do". Later another character

remarks that "Shane did what he had to do". In John Steinbeck - The Grapes of Wrath Ch18, 1939, you get Casey saying "I know

this - a man got to do what he got to do".

Johnny Weismuller l did not say "Me Tarzan, you Jane." in the 1932 film. The source of the phrase is an interview, given by the swimmer and athlete

who took the part of Tarzan in the film, to Photoplay Magazine, June 1932. Reflecting on the small demands the film had made on

his abilities, he said "I didn't have to act in 'Tarzan the Ape Man' - just said, "Me Tarzan, you Jane." That in fact was a contraction

and paraphrase of the film script which had him and Jane Parker tapping themselves and repeating their names.

Wellington l did not say Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton (see Wellington-11)

l He almost certainly did not say "I don't know what they do to the enemy but by God they frighten me" (see Wellington-15)

l It is very unlikely he said "Up guards and at'em".

Mae West l is usually quoted as having said "Come up and see me sometime" in the film She Done Him Wrong of 1933. It was her adaptation

of the play Diamond Lil and what she actually said was "Why don't you come up sometime, see me". In My Little Chickadee of

1940 which she co-scripted with W C Fields the well-known version does appear but is said by Fields.

l "Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?" is also apocryphal. It certainly has not appeared in any of her films.

According to Leslie Halliwell - Halliwell's Filmgoer's Companion and others, what she ad-libbed in a 1940 New York play

Catherine Was Great when her co-star's cloak became entangled with his sword was "Lieutenant is that your sword or are you just

pleased to see me?" According to some versions it was "glad to see me". According to Jill Watts – Mae West: an icon in Black and

White, 2001, when she arrived in Los Angeles in 1936 she said to the policemen deputed to escort her home “Is that a gun in your

pocket or are you happy to see me?”

13

Kaiser Wilhelm's l telegram from Ems to Bismarck in Berlin, 13 July 1870, complained Count Benedetti had been pressing him never to permit the

candidature of Prince Leopold for the throne of Spain to be revived. Bismarck got together with von Moltke and concocted an

abridged edition which as von Moltke put it "has a different ring; before it sounded like a parley; now it is like a flourish in answer

to a challenge". The relevant passage, as doctored by Bismarck, read that having been asked never to back a renewal of

Hohenzollern candidature "His Majesty the King, thereupon decided not to receive the French ambassador again, and the aide-de-

camp on duty to tell him that his Majesty had nothing further to communicate to the ambassador}". As they hoped this got the

French so cross they declared war.

John Wilkes l probably did not say that whether he died on the gallows or of the pox depended on whether he embraced the Earl of Sandwich's

principles or mistress (see Wilkes-1). It is certainly odd that the first reference appears about 150 years after the supposed

conversation.

John Wilson, the Victorian Scottish journalist who used the nom de plume Christopher North

l is widely quoted as referring to the British empire "on which the sun never sets". But the notion goes back more than 2,000 years.

See AlexanderGt-1 Camoens-1 Claudian-1 1TFuller-7 Gage-1 Guarini-1 JHowell-2 TMacaulay-77 Ovid-9 PhilipII-1 Schippius-1

JSmith-1 Tibullus-1 Virgil-1 JWilson-1.

The Duchess of Windsor l is normally credited with having said "You can't be too rich or too thin" but there is no record of when and to whom she might have

said it. The earliest recorded instance of the sentiment was by Truman Capote on television.

Mrs Henry Wood l did not write the line "Dead, dead, and never called me mother" in her fabulously successful melodramatic novel East Lynne.

Something approximating it appears in one of the many stage adaptations of the novel by pirates in the years after the book's

publication in 1861. But see EWood-1.

General Gregori Yevseyevich Zinoviev, born Radomisky, (1883-1936)

l was not the author of the notorious Zinoviev letter he was claimed to have sent to the Workers Party of America in 1923. The

American Secretary of State, Charles Hughes, published the document, forged by the predecessor of the FBI, which read "We hope

the party will step by step embrace the proletarian forces of America, and in the not too distant future raise the red flag over the

White House". The following year a group of Polish emigrés in Britain copied the idea and published a similar forgery before the

General Election to sabotage an Anglo-Soviet trade agreement. That letter read "Armed warfare must be preceded by a struggle

against the inclinations to compromise which are embedded among the majority of British workmen, against the idea of evolution

and peaceful extermination of capitalism. Only then will it be possible to count upon complete success of an armed insurrection".

<reported in The Times and other papers, 25 Oct 1924> That letter was generally thought to have lost Labour the election despite

getting an increased number of votes. Details of the forgery are in Chester, Fay, Young - The Zinoviev Letter, 1967>