Quote Unquote

Quote Unquote (1980) – Nigel Rees
Unwin Paperbacks | ISBN: 0048270202
Condition: Very Good | Sold by Crappy Old Books

Everybody loves a good quotation, particularly when it makes them sound considerably more intelligent than they actually are. There’s nothing quite like dropping a perfectly chosen remark from Oscar Wilde, Winston Churchill or some long-deceased Greek philosopher into an otherwise unremarkable conversation about the price of potatoes. Suddenly, you’re not merely complaining about inflation. You’re participating in the grand intellectual tradition of Western civilisation.

Welcome to Quote Unquote, Nigel Rees’s delightful excursion into the wonderful world of memorable words, celebrated sayings and the curious human habit of borrowing somebody else’s wit whenever our own supply runs dangerously low.

Rees, a broadcaster, author and enthusiastic collector of verbal curiosities, is perhaps best known for his long-running BBC Radio 4 programme Quote... Unquote, in which quotations, misquotations and linguistic oddities provided endless opportunities for entertainment. This accompanying literary offering captures much of that same fascination with the things people say, the people who supposedly said them, and the remarkable frequency with which history manages to get the attribution completely wrong.

For quotations are slippery little creatures. A particularly clever observation might begin life in an obscure nineteenth-century novel, acquire a new author somewhere along the way, and eventually emerge as something Abraham Lincoln allegedly said while eating breakfast. Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde and Churchill have collectively been credited with enough witty remarks to suggest that none of them ever had time to sleep.

The pleasure of a collection like this lies not merely in discovering clever expressions but in appreciating humanity’s enduring talent for compressing enormous quantities of wisdom, foolishness, cynicism and outright nonsense into remarkably few words. A good quotation can settle an argument, start another, decorate a wedding speech or provide the perfect excuse for doing absolutely nothing productive all afternoon.

Published in 1980, this Unwin paperback belongs to a more civilised age of verbal entertainment, when people collected quotations in notebooks rather than posting inspirational statements over photographs of sunsets. Back then, an amusing observation might be shared over dinner instead of being attributed to Albert Einstein and circulated among eleven million people who never bothered to check.

Rees’s enthusiasm for language makes this an appealing volume for lovers of literary trivia, amateur philosophers, crossword enthusiasts, public speakers and anyone who appreciates the fine distinction between genuine wisdom and something that merely sounds impressive when delivered in a confident voice.

This 1980 Unwin Paperbacks edition, offered in Very Good condition by Crappy Old Books, is a splendid addition to the bookshelf of anyone who enjoys words behaving badly, historical personalities being unexpectedly amusing, or the comforting discovery that people have been saying ridiculous things for centuries.

A delightful celebration of borrowed brilliance, memorable remarks and the peculiar immortality of a well-turned phrase.

After all, why struggle to think of something clever yourself when somebody considerably more talented said it two hundred years ago?

And if nobody actually said it, there’s always Churchill.

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