Tag Archives: humor

The Algonquin Wits: Dorothy Parker on Claire Boothe Luce

Posted on July 23, 2019 | Leave a comment

“Told that Clare Boothe Luce was invariably kind to her inferiors, Mrs. Parker asked, ‘And where does she find them?'”

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.

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Rotten Rejections: Memo from a Chinese Economic Journal…

Posted on July 22, 2019 | Leave a comment

“We have read your manuscript with boundless delight. If we were to publish your paper, it would be impossible for us to publish any work of lower standard. And as it is unthinkable that in the next thousand years we shall see its equal, we are, to our regret, compelled to return your divine composition, and to beg you a thousand times to overlook our short sight and timidity.”

Excerpted from: Bernard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.

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The Algonquin Wits: Franklin Pierce Adams on Nostalgia

Posted on July 12, 2019 | Leave a comment

“Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory.”

Franklin Pierce Adams

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.

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The Devil’s Dictionary: Attorney

Posted on July 7, 2019 | Leave a comment

“Attorney, n. A person legally appointed to mismanage one’s affairs which one has not himself the skill to rightly mismanage.”

Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. David E. Schultz and S.J. Joshi, eds. The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2000. 

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Philander Knox on Politics as Usual

Posted on June 25, 2019 | Leave a comment

“Oh, Mr. President, do not let so great an achievement suffer from any taint of legality.”

Philander C. Knox (1853-1921)

Quoted in Tyler Dennett, John Hay: From Poetry to Politics (1933). Knox’s reply, as attorney general, to President Theodore Roosevelt’s request for a legal justification of his acquisition of the Panama Canal Zone.

Excerpted from: Shapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.

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George Bernard Shaw on Newspapers

Posted on June 24, 2019 | Leave a comment

“A newspaper is a device unable to discriminate between a bicycle accident and the collapse of civilization.”

George Bernard Shaw

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

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Frank Zappa on Rock Journalism

Posted on June 19, 2019 | Leave a comment

“Rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read.”

Frank Zappa

Quoted in Chicago Tribune, 18 Jan. 1978

Excerpted from: Shapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.

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Memo from John Gardner

Posted on June 18, 2019 | Leave a comment

“One should fight like the devil the temptation to think well of editors. They are all, without exception–at least some of the time–incompetent or lazy. By the nature of their profession they read too much, with the result they grow jaded and cannot recognize talent though it dances in front of their eyes.”

John Gardner

Excerpted from: Bernard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.

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Rotten Rejections: The Lonely by Paul Gallico

Posted on June 13, 2019 | Leave a comment

“My dear boy, what a masterpiece! How beautifully thought out! What color, what fire! It’s truly magnificent writing. It’s so poetic. Do take it over to Harper’s Bazaar where they will really know how to appreciate it.”

Excerpted from: Bernard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.

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The Algonquin Wits: Heywood Broun on His Dooryard

Posted on June 13, 2019 | Leave a comment

“Many people [in the city] buy a house just to get the trees which are thrown in with the deal. I’ve got three and a large part of the overhang from a tree next door. This trespasser, from a strictly material standpoint, is a finer three than any which I possess, but I prefer my own horse chestnut just the same. It’s a one-man tree and would never think of dividing its loyalty between two houses.”

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.

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