The Quote Verifier: Who Said What, Where, and WhenSt. Martin's Publishing Group, 1. apr 2007 - 416 pages Our language is full of hundreds of quotations that are often cited but seldom confirmed. Ralph Keyes's The Quote Verifier considers not only classic misquotes such as "Nice guys finish last," and "Play it again, Sam," but more surprising ones such as "Ain't I a woman?" and "Golf is a good walk spoiled," as well as the origins of popular sayings such as "The opera ain't over till the fat lady sings," "No one washes a rented car," and "Make my day." |
From inside the book
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... thought was usually attributed to Dwight Eisenhower. Or did Napoleon say it? George Patton perhaps? No one seemed sure. This observation actually originated with Helmuth von Moltke in the mid-nineteenth century. The Prussian field ...
... thought it was Lincoln who explained that he'd written a long letter because he didn't have time to write a short one. Only after undertaking to verify quotations did I discover that this comment originated with Blaise Pascal. In a ...
... thought to be the quip of American octogenarian Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., French Premier Georges Clemenceau, or Prussian Field Marshal Friedrich von Wrangel. Misattribution works best if the person quoted is not around to correct the ...
... thought in the mid-1970s, however, Harvard political scientist Richard Neustadt told a reporter, “Academic politics is much more vicious than real politics. We think it's because the stakes are so small.” Others believe this quip ...
... thought Wanamaker expressed the famous adage in 1885, but it gave no context. While researching John Wanamaker, King of Merchants (1993), biographer William Allen Zulker found the adage typed on a sheet of paper in Wanamaker's archives ...
Contents
1 | |
BIBLIOGRAPHY | 259 |
SOURCE NOTES | 267 |
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS | 345 |
KEY WORD INDEX | 347 |
NAME INDEX | 375 |
SIDEBAR INDEX | 389 |