{"id":4385,"date":"2019-01-12T07:24:52","date_gmt":"2019-01-12T12:24:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/?p=4385"},"modified":"2019-01-14T06:43:43","modified_gmt":"2019-01-14T11:43:43","slug":"did-winston-churchill-really-say-that","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/did-winston-churchill-really-say-that\/","title":{"rendered":"Did Winston Churchill Really Say That?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Read any book about World War II and you\u2019re bound to find inspiring quotes by Winston Churchill, along with some withering comments he made about rival politicians. One of his favorite targets was Clement Attlee who inspired these classic lines:<\/p>\n

–A sheep in sheep\u2019s clothing.<\/p>\n

–A modest man, who has much to be modest about.<\/p>\n

–An empty taxi arrived at 10 Downing Street, and when the door was opened, Attlee got out.<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

My multilingual mother\u2013given to quotations in Latin, German and French\u2013especially loved the middle one above. She also credited Churchill with the line \u201cEvery time he opens his mouth he subtracts from the sum total of human knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

When I looked for the source, the brilliant line didn\u2019t show up anywhere on Churchill web sites. But there\u2019s a cinematic connection: The Dark Horse<\/a><\/em>, a forgotten 1932 political satire starring Bette Davis.<\/p>\n

\"dark<\/a>It features a nitwit politician whose adviser has instructed him to answer tough questions with \u201cWell yes, but then again no.\u201d\u00a0 The politician is classed as \u201cso dumb that every time he opens his mouth he subtracts from the sum total of human knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

The line\u2019s political lineage extends further back to the powerful Republican Speaker of the House Thomas B. Reed<\/a>, who was nicknamed \u201cCzar Reed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>In 1909, Pearson Magazine<\/em> no. 22 reported Reed explaining why he ignored one Representative while paying attention to another:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhenever A takes the floor, the House learns something, but when that fellow B speaks, he invariably subtracts from the sum total of human knowledge.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We have to assume the line had filtered into political discourse enough so that the script writers of Dark Horse<\/em> could use it to comic effect not too many years later.\u00a0 Did Reed come up with it on his own?\u00a0 At first it seems likely, since his recent biographer says he was renowned for his wit<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Teddy Roosevelt, though, would seem to get ultimate credit for the phrase.\u00a0 Biographers Peter Collier and David Horowitz<\/a> wrote that TR used it to dismiss an opponent on New York\u2019s Civil Service Commission when he was the Commissioner from 1889-1895. He put down his rival with these words: \u201cEvery time he opens his mouth, he subtracts from the sum total of human wisdom.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Theodore-Roosevelt_The-Talented-Mr-Roosevelt_HD_768x432-16x9\"<\/a>Lev Raphael\u2019s comic mystery series<\/a>, set in the hothouse world of academia, has been praised by The New York Times Book Review<\/em> and many other newspapers. You can find them on Amazon<\/a>.\u00a0 Lev teaches online writing creative workshops at writewithoutborders.com<\/a>.
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Read any book about World War II and you\u2019re bound to find inspiring quotes by Winston Churchill, along with some withering comments he made about rival politicians. One of his favorite targets was Clement Attlee who inspired these classic lines: –A sheep in sheep\u2019s clothing. –A modest man, who has much to be modest about. … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1655],"tags":[412,408,1654,1656,1129,1259,216,583,1248,1132,406,407,414,1653,410,419],"class_list":["post-4385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-winston-churchill","tag-bette-davis","tag-churchill","tag-clement-atlee","tag-dark-horse","tag-famous-quotations","tag-http-writewithoutborders-com","tag-humor","tag-nick-hoffman-mysteries","tag-nick-hoffman-mystery-series","tag-politics","tag-quotations","tag-sarcasm","tag-teddy-roosevelt","tag-tr","tag-winston-churchill","tag-wit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4385"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4385\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4395,"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4385\/revisions\/4395"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.levraphael.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}