[John Whitworth]

Mention of Cecil Rhodes on another thread leads me to post this, something I've been thinking of for a couple of weeks. The idea is to write a poem, rhyming and scanning and all that, that begins with a direct quotation from somebody, not neccessarily a POETIC quotation. In fact it's more fun if it isn't. . I'm working on Marlowe's 'Those that love not tobacco and boys are fools', but I haven't got it right. The connection between smoking and gayness isn't self-evident. This is what Rhodes actually said re Englishness:

For He Is an Englishman

The opening lines are by Cecil Rhodes, and not, as many seem to think, by Rudyard Kipling

An Englishman has drawn first prize
In the lottery of life.
Is such a bald assertion wise?
An Englishman has drawn first prize?
You stagger in a wild surmise.
No trouble and no strife?
An Englishman has drawn first prize
In the lottery of life.

An Englishman has drawn first prize
In the lottery of life.
No foreigner will recognize
An Englishman has drawn first prize.
A fairy tale! A pack of lies!
An error all too rife!
An Englishman has drawn first prize
In the lottery of life.

An Englishman has drawn first prize
In the lottery of life.
You open wide those startled eyes.
An Englishman has drawn first prize?
An Englishman? Surprise, surprise!
Have you informed his wife?
An Englishman has drawn first prize
In the lottery of life.

[R. S. Gwynn]

Poem Beginning with Two Lines Attributed to Abraham Lincoln

If this is tea, please bring me some coffee.
If this is coffee, please bring me some tea.
If this is a mule, please bring me some toffee.
If this is tea, please bring me some coffee;
If this is a strumpet, please bring me a strophe.
If this is my Bonnie, please bring her to me.
If this is tea, please bring me some coffee.
If this is coffee, please bring me some tea.

If this is a cat, please bring me a chauffeur.
If this is a sandwich, please call me a doc.
If this is a brogan, please bring me a loafer.
If this is a cat, please bring me a chauffeur.
If this is Chicago, please bring me Ophir.
If this is a mummy, please bring me a clock.
If this is a cat, please bring me a chauffeur.
If this is a sandwich, please call me a doc.

[John Whitworth]

Do you know, that's as good as mine. Not better don't you know,but as good. Under what circumstances did Lincoln speak these immortal lines?

[R. S. Gwynn]

It has often been cited as an example of Presidential wit. Why, I'm not quite sure.

http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/626.html

[John Whitworth]

I have the impression that you don't do witty presidents - except maybe for Harry Truman. Pity Adlai Stevenson was never elected. Did Theodore Roosevelt say witty things? We had Disraeli, Churchill and Macmillan, who could all be pretty funny, and all Tories.The left round here don't appear to do jokes. Boris for PM.

[Holly Martins]

This one's from The Poni-Tails hit of 1958. I've discovered the line doesn't actually appear in the song! But this is how I always remember it.


GREAT WALL OF CHINA

Born too late for you to love me,
she would sing and I would push her
from my lap and make pretend
that work was preferable to sex.

How stupid I was then! Those half
a dozen years that made me think
I was too old for her - my loss
immense and insurmountable.

[FOsen]

Okay, so this isn't a direct quote, but it's one of my new favorites, so forgive the paraphrase.

At Ilkley literature festival, a woman shrieked and vomited during a Ted Hughes reading. I must say, I’ve never felt like shrieking.
--Philip Larkin to Robert Conquest, 15 June, 1975

A woman shrieked and puked while Hughes was reading;
That’s odd, because I’ve never felt like shrieking,
Not even when my tortured ears were bleeding
And all around, the vomit stench was reeking,
I hardly ever, once, have felt like shrieking.

Frank

[John Whitworth]

Do you know, Frank, that had me giggling uncontrollably.