The quote– great for so many reasons
One of the greatest time savers for anyone who has ever worked in an office is the beloved Executive Summary. When a big report lands in the inbox, whether one is a worker bee or a manager, we all breathe easier if there is an Executive Summary at the beginning. With this gem of summation, normally just a few paragraphs long, we can grasp 90% of the report’s meaning without having to plow through hundreds of pages of text and charts.
For judgmental types who think the Exec Summary is an indication of the modern generation’s short attention span, I would argue that even our forefathers had ADD for they developed their own version of the Summary—one that has saved time for hundreds of years now. This little giant of convenience is, of course, the quote. Yes, the quote—where entire paragraphs, chapters, and books are condensed into just a sentence or two.
While I would like to think that we should thank the writers and speakers themselves for crafting this wonder, in reality the credit goes to the readers and listeners who have winnowed speakers’ and writers’ words down to what is memorable. These selfless champions have graciously “had our back” in tackling even the longest speeches and books.
Edward Everett, for example, spoke for a whopping two hours before Abraham Lincoln even took to the rostrum at Gettysburg. Lincoln, mercifully, delivered his Gettysburg Address in less than two minutes. Today, of course, we remember Lincoln’s words and not those of Everett—who was considered the “great orator of his time.” The people taking notes that day obviously, and fortunately, decided that it was better to quote Abe as he got right to the point.
Who, after all, doesn’t like a good quote? They are the diamonds of our language, easy to remember, and we can find an endless supply of them online. Recently though, I was reading something called a book—a hardcover one at that. You might remember these sources of reading material as they used to be quite popular…seriously!
Schott knows that we are too intense these days and that a good distraction is therefore as refreshing as that first glass of champagne. This has certainly been my goal in the Just Average movement, for as Oscar Wilde once said: It is a very sad thing that nowadays there is so little useless information!
You are probably familiar with the following writers and know that some of them have hundreds of famous quotes. Here I strive to present just an appetizer. All but one or two of these come from the aforementioned Schott’s Original Miscellany and so I attribute him as the source. He has, in a most generous manner, given us an Executive Summary of quotes! Here are a few:
Dorothy Parker
• On Katherine Hepburn: She ran the whole gamut of emotions from A to B
• This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown aside with great force
• If you want to know what God thinks of money, look at the people he gave it to
Oscar Wilde – Perhaps the greatest of all times with bon mots!
• I can resist everything except temptation
• The way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it
• A man cannot be too careful in his choice of enemies
Bertrand Russell
• If one man offers you democracy and another offers you a bag of grain, at what stage of starvation will you prefer grain to the vote?
Clive James
• He had every characteristic of leadership except followers
Churchill – in speaking about a political opponent
• He is a very humble man and indeed he has much to be humble about!
Shakespeare
• False of Heart, light of Ear, bloody handed, Hog in sloth, Fox in stealth, Wolf in greediness, Dog in madness, Lion in Prey.
Ambrose Bierce is one of the Just Average movement’s heroes. I will eventually put a write-up about him in the Pantheon section as he is simply a brilliant figure. Known as the “American Swift,” he was a combat veteran of the American Civil War and later a journalist—one with a wit that was not equaled until H.L. Mencken came along in the early 1900s. In his Devil’s Dictionary Bierce plays around with some humorous definitions
• Habit: a shackle for the free
• Twice: once too often
• Love: a temporary malady usually cured by marriage
• Politics: The conduct of public affairs for private advantage
• Litigation: A machine which you go in as a pig and come out as a sausage
• Bore: a person who talks when you wish him to listen
• Coward: One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs
• Erudition: Dust shaken out of a book and into an empty skull
• Zeal: a certain nervous disorder afflicting the young and the inexperienced
Samuel Johnson, 1709 to 1784, is the grandfather of all good quotes and quips. Some are quite serious while some humorous. All, however, have something important to say.
• Whatever you have, spend less
• The true art of memory is the art of attention. (I agree 100% with Johnson here and would wager that most of what we think of as “not remembering,” is simply that we did not pay attention)
• As peace is the end of war, so to be idle is the ultimate purpose of the busy
• He was dull in a new way, and that made many people think him great
• It is wonderful that five thousand years have now elapsed since the creation of the world, and still it is undecided whether or not there has ever been an instance of any person appearing after death. All argument is against it, but belief is for it
• When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford
Note: I have adopted one of his great statements as a guiding principle for the Just Average movement. “Are we not busy so we can eventually be idle?” he asks. I know that many don’t think this is the case but I certainly do!
Samuel Goldwyn
Although this cannot be confirmed as true, the story has it that someone once asked him, the great Hollywood movie producer, if his movies were meant to have a message. His reply? If I wanted to send a message, I would use Western Union!
Note: Western Union, a message service, is still in existence believe it or not.
The great thing about quotes is that there is an endless supply of them and no doubt you have your favorites. They are like food in that we each have our own tastes. What might seem witty and insightful to me, might be bland and boring to you.
No matter what your taste though, it is up to us, in this generation, to preserve quotes and make them accessible to the readers and conversationalists who follow in the years to come.
As one of humanity’s great treasures, long may they live!
I’m up for a Trip to London! Theater, Baroque Music…what more could one ask for besides a descent meal.
As the great Samual Johnson said: When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford
London–Have to agree with Johnson on this one as there is no greater place in the world. If you get bored in London then all is lost.
When it comes to eats, they do have Pizza Express there which is one of my all time faves. Now if we could just get them to take up some good Tex-Mex, Southern BBQ, and otherwise good chow it would be perfect.