The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Humorous Quotations

By Fred Metcalf

Book Overview

What's the funniest thing you've ever heard? Who said it? Was is Oscar Wilde, P.G. Wodehouse (The Right Hon. was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and had forgotten to say "When"!), Groucho Marx (A hospital bed is a parked taxi with the meter running), Nancy Mitford (She said that all the sights of Rome were called after London cinemas), Lily Tomlin (Man invented language to satisfy his deep need to complain), Homer Simpson (To alcohol! The cause of-and solution to-all of life's problems!) or Joan Rivers (I don't exercise. If God wanted me to bend over, he would have put diamonds on the floor)? May be it was Noel Coward, Jack Dee, H.L. Mencken, Woody Allen or Rowan Atkinson? They are all here: over 5,500 quotations from the funniest people of the past hundred years. The quotations are grouped thematically, covering catgories from abstinence, bosses and honeymoons (Honeymoon-the morning after the knot before) to wealth, wine and Yugoslavia, via creativity, pets (Springfield Pet Shop: All Our Pets are Flushable) and swimming (They say that swimming is great exercise. Have you ever seen a whale?). The result is a book which will give the reader a line for any kind of speech or simply provide hours of pleasurable browsing. He who laughs, lasts-Mary Pettibone Poole.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140075682
• ISBN13: 9780140075687
• Release Date: March 1988
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.1" x 1.0" x 5.9"

Customer Reviews

Pithy, witty, insightful...

Not the kind of book to read cover-to-cover, but absolutely perfect when you are looking for a pithy quote on any subject...and read a few pages when you need a laugh!

invaluable

Anyone who has to make a speech will make a better one if they have this book.

The best

This is the only book I keep in the toilet. I read it every time I have to sit down and each time I get such a buzz. This is such an amazing cornucopia of brilliant minds (being very, very witty). I rate it up there with any non-fiction reference book out there for reasonably well read people who need a chuckle EVERY time they open it up.

A CONVERSATION PIECE........

Alas! A good reason for you not to buy any of those joke books. Instead, acquire this wonderful recollection of funny phrases actually said or written........ Suggested to witty quotation fans, of course, but a must for those that don't possess humor but do have a good memory !!!!! A compilation of hilarious phrases, edited by Fred Metcalf that will not let you down, in any argument or discussion. Good to break the ice, superb to outwit your opponent, it is the perfect tool to keep at bay the drama, in heavier conversations. Talking to the pretentious literati or author, you get to say: "A good writer is not, per se, a good critic. No more than a good drunk is automatically a good bartender..." If he replies: "Critics are like eunuchs in a harem: they know how it's done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves" then you can say: "I never read a book before reviewing it- it prejudices a man so...." and then add: "Thank you for sending me a copy of your book. I'll waste no time in reading it..."

Buy this. Now.

"The trouble with my car is that it won't start and the payments won't stop""I care a lot about my wife's happiness. So much so that's I've hired a private detective to find out who's responsible for it."This book is an excellent collection of one-liners. Unlike many joke books, over 90% of its jokes are actually funny! There's a good indexing system as well. Though admittedly there's no entry for jokes on bicycles.