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Misquoting

January 26, 2011 //  by David Keyes

Toronto Globe and Mail

By Michael Kesterton

Why is it so easy to get quotations wrong? “Our memory wants quotations to be better than they usually were, and said by the person we want to have said them,” writes Ralph Keyes in The Quote Verifier: Who Said What, Where, and When. A good line — such as “any man who is not a socialist at 20 has no heart, and anyone who is still a socialist at 40 has no head” — deserves a Churchill (or a Disraeli or a Bismarck), adds The Boston Globe reviewer. Unfortunately, the sentiment originated with a French statesman named Francois Guizot. Who wants to quote Francois Guizot?

Category: press-quote

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