Famous Retorts
Of Clemmet Atlee, Churchill said "He's a sheep in sheep's clothing."
Physicist Wolfgang Pauli upon reading a submitted paper: "This isn't right, this isn't even wrong."
Anonymous actress: I enjoyed reading your book [Past Imperfect]. Who wrote it for you?
Ilka Chase: Darling, I'm so glad that you liked it. Who read it to you?
Lady Astor: Winston: If I were married to you, I'd put poison in your coffee.
Sir Winston Churchill: Nancy, if you were my wife, I'd drink it.
Henry Clay: I would rather be right than be president.
Congressman Reed: He doesn't have to worry. He'll never be either.
Lord Sandwich: Really, Mr. Wilkes, I don't know whether you'll die on the gallows or of the pox.
John Wilkes: That depend, my lord, on whether I embrace your principles or your mistress.
Lewis Morris: It is a conspiracy of silence against me - a conspiracy of silence. What should I do.
Oscar Wilde: Join it.
Anonymous singer: You know, my dear, I insured my voice for fifty thousand dollars.
Miriam Hopkins: That's wonderful. And what did you do with the money?
Wife of prominent politician to Winston Churchill (with distain in her voice): Mr. Churchill, you are drunk!
Mr. Churchill: Yes, madam, and you are ugly. But in the morning, I will be sober, and you will still be ugly.
Frederic Leighton (to James McNeill Whistler): My dear Whistler, you leave your pictures in such a sketchy, unfinished state. Why don't you ever finish them?
James McNeill Whistler, (in reply): My dear Leighton, why do you ever begin yours?
Joe Frazier (about Muhammad Ali): He's phony, using his blackness to get his way.
Muhammad Ali: Joe Frazier is so ugly he should donate his face to the US Bureau of Wildlife.
Noel Coward to Edna Ferber, who was wearing a tailored suit: "You look almost like a man."
Edna Ferber: "So do you,"
I have more talent in my smallest fart than you have in your entire body.
Walter Matthau (to Barbra Steisand)
I loathe you. You revolt me stewing in your consumption . . . you are a loathsome reptile - I hope you die.
D. H. Lawrence (to Katherine Mansfield)
George Bernard Shaw (to Winston Churchill): Am reserving two tickets for you for my premiere. Come and bring a friend - if you have one.
Churchill: Impossible to be present for the first performance. Will attend second - if there is one.
Former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's response to learning that Richard Nixon called him an a-hole:
"I've been called worse things by better men." |
