Truer Words Were Never Spoken
"I have never thought much of the courage of a lion-tamer. Man is the only animal of which I am thoroughly and cravenly afraid. There is not much harm in a lion. It has no ideals, no sect, no party, no religion. In other words, no reason to kill something it does not wish to eat."
The author of this particular thought is quoted 'round the world on many, many topics. Often, his words evoke wry laughter at both the truth and the sting of the "gotcha."
Without looking it up...any guesses about his identity?
(Warning: You won't find this quote whole, either. It has been chopped into pieces and strewn across the internet like so much confetti. I had to go find a dead-tree book in order to get the thing entirely in one piece.)
ANSWER: George Bernard Shaw, who voiced more than just one or two quotables...so pick your own favorite.
The author of this particular thought is quoted 'round the world on many, many topics. Often, his words evoke wry laughter at both the truth and the sting of the "gotcha."
Without looking it up...any guesses about his identity?
(Warning: You won't find this quote whole, either. It has been chopped into pieces and strewn across the internet like so much confetti. I had to go find a dead-tree book in order to get the thing entirely in one piece.)
ANSWER: George Bernard Shaw, who voiced more than just one or two quotables...so pick your own favorite.
posted by Chimera at 5:04 PM
17 Comments:
I'll take a wild guess (well... based on other quotes I've read by the man) - Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain?ht
That was also my first guess when I saw it for the first time. It does sound awfully like him, doesn't it? But no...
Churchill...?? Ghandi...?? ummmmm.... I give up...
ok, well I took my wild guess. So time to look it up :)
Ahhhh... interesting. Yes, the author is widely quoted. In fact, he'd probably laugh is head off at the recent kerfuffle of someone giving an interview wherein certain bodily functions were discussed.
I, on the other hand, am afraid of lions.
I can share a bus with as many human beings as you can pack into it. Statistically, some of those people are probably armed, and some might have criminal records.
Almost all would belong to some political party. Most probably attend some kind of religious services, or at least consider themselves religious. Many even have ideals.
I would ignore them and read a newspaper.
But, place even one lion on that bus, and it would have my full attention. There is a good chance that I would want to get off before my stop.
Human beings tend to take themselves much too seriously.
Not Churchill, not Ghandi. Hint: He was born on an island...
Dez: I know a few people who, if they saw a lion on a bus, would probably want to pet the big kitty. ;-)
Aha! A little research is a dangerous thing. With the little I know about the fella, the quote sure does sound like him. :-)
And yep, I'd probably be one of the people wanting to pet the big kitty. One of my all-time favorite memories is my close encounter with a half-grown Siberian tiger and I'd repeat things like that given half a chance.
Ian: "...recent kerfuffle of someone giving an interview wherein certain bodily functions were discussed."
What am I missing and where do I find it?
Hint Number Two: He was a vegetarian, probably prompting one of his enemies to coin the phrase, "You are what you eat."
TIGER! swear like crazy... mumble about MANGO'S and stay in the boat for the rest of "my favorite movie of all time"...
Okay I cheated and found out who it is... Wikopedia is a wonderful thing...
Without looking at the comments, I'm going to guess Kipling.
damn
Chim.. your author once said something to the effect, "Sex is the most over rated pleasure of all man kind, and a good bowel movement is the most under rated pleasure."
Which leads me to think that your author would have laughed out loud over the kerfuffle of what's his name, giving an interview, and basically saying something similar.
Kipling was an excellent guess...geographically closer than anyone else guessed so far...and they were pretty much contemporaries, too. So they probably knew each other, and influenced each other...
Ian: Forgive me...I may seem a tad dense on this, but who is "what's his name" and what interview are you talking about?
Hint number three: He won a Nobel prize for Literature...
Chim, I forget the guy's name or even his position within the Canadian government, but some were all a titter about this guy giving an interview to a publication, and during the interview he discussed bowel movements.
Mark Steyn even wrote about it in The Western Unstandard a couple of weeks ago.
Okay...I missed that one. Haven't been over there for awhile. I guess I have some catching up to do. Thanks.
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