Humor e Ironia

If you give to a thief he cannot steal from you, and then he is no longer a thief.

Aristotle maintained that women have fewer teeth than men; although he was twice married, it never occurred to him to verify this statement by examining his wives’ mouths.

Even in Paris, I remained a Canadian. I puffed hashish, but I didn’t inhale.

Rire est le propre de l’homme .

The two ladies [Dorothy Parker and Clare Boothe Luce] were trying to get out of a doorway at the same time. Clare drew back and cracked, “Age before beauty, Miss Parker.” As Dotty swept out, she turned to the other guests and said, “Pearls before swine.”

Then I remember her comment on one friend who had lamed herself while in London. It was Mrs. Parker who voiced the suspicion that this poor lady had injured herself while sliding down a barrister.

[ On women writers :] As artists they’re rot, but as providers they’re oil wells; they gush. Norris said she never wrote a story unless it was fun to do. I understand Ferber whistles at her typewriter. And there was that poor sucker Flaubert rolling around on his floor for three days looking for the right word.

[ Of an actress who was said to be kind to her inferiors :] Where does she find them?

[ Responding to a hostess being described as “outspoken” :] Outspoken by whom?

[ When told of the death of Calvin Coolidge :] How can they tell?

[ Of a cocktail party she had attended :] One more drink and I’d have been under the host!

[ Of a performance by Katharine Hepburn :] Let’s all go to see Miss Hepburn and hear her run the gamut of emotions from A to B!

[ Telegram to Mary Sherwood, who finally had her baby after a much-ballyhooed pregnancy, 1915 :]

[ When asked about the most beautiful words in the English language :] The ones I like . . . are “cheque” and “inclosed.”

That woman speaks eighteen languages, and can’t say No in any of them.

[ Her suggested epitaph for herself :] Excuse My Dust.

[ Of Ernest Hemingway :] He has a capacity for enjoyment so vast that he gives away great chunks to those about him, and never even misses them. . . . He can take you to a bicycle race and make it raise your hair.

It may be that this autobiography [Aimee Semple McPherson’s] is set down in sincerity, frankness, and simple effort. It may be, too, that the Statue of Liberty is situated in Lake Ontario.

[ Reviewing A. A. Milne’s The House at Pooh Corner in her “Constant Reader” column :] Tonstant Weader Fwowed up.

Salary is no object; I want only enough to keep body and soul apart.

Take me or leave me; or, as is the usual order of things, both.

For my own part I don’t object to old jokes—indeed, I reverence them. When sea-sickness and adultery have ceased to be funny, western civilization will have ceased to exist.

Never mind the bottle, as long as it gets you drunk.

I like to enjoy myself, but rest assured that I can be as serious as anyone else can.