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cateyes1

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When Insults Had Class
« on: January 09, 2012, 05:06:37 am »
 

These glorious insults are from an era before the English language got boiled down to "four letter" words.

The exchange between Churchill & Lady Astor:
She said, "If you were my husband, I'd give you poison."
He said, "If you were my wife, I'd drink it."

A member of Parliament to Disraeli: "Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease."
"That depends, Sir," said Disraeli, "whether I embrace your policies or your mistress."

"He had delusions of adequacy." - Walter Kerr

"He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire." - Winston Churchill

"I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure."  Clarence Darrow

"He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary."  William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway)

"Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I'll waste no time reading it." - Moses Hadas

"I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it." - Mark Twain

"He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends..." - Oscar Wilde

"I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend, if... you have one." - George Bernard Shaw to Winston Churchill
"Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second, if... there is one." -  Winston Churchill, in response.

"I feel so miserable without you; it's almost like having you here." - Stephen Bishop

"He is a self-made man and worships his creator." - John Bright

"I've just learned about his illness. Let's hope it's nothing trivial" - Irvin S. Cobb

"He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others." - Samuel Johnson

"He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up." - Paul Keating

"In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily." - Charles, Count Talleyrand

"He loves nature in spite of what it did to him." - Forrest Tucker

"Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?" - Mark Twain

"His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork." - Mae West

"Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go..." - Oscar Wilde

"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts: for support rather than illumination. " - Andrew Lang (1844-1912)

"He has Van Gogh's ear for music." - Billy Wilder

*"I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it." - Groucho Marx   
 

 


kay7

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #1 on: January 09, 2012, 06:05:31 am »
Loved this post  :) :)  Where did you find all those?  It certainly is a dying art as most young people seem to favor 4-letter words over vocabulary  :BangHead:


cateyes1

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #2 on: January 09, 2012, 06:13:14 am »
Loved this post  :) :)  Where did you find all those?  It certainly is a dying art as most young people seem to favor 4-letter words over vocabulary  :BangHead:


Hi Kay, my brother inlaw sends me these things lol...oh how I HATE 4 letter words especially when it's every other one with the younger generation UGH...where is the soap lol

Abrupt

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #3 on: January 09, 2012, 06:15:57 am »
Great share here, absolutely love these gems.
There are only 10 types of people in the world:  those who understand binary, and those who don't.

GramPolly3

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #4 on: January 09, 2012, 06:20:10 am »
Marvelous post! So much of our thoughts and use of our language has been given over to one-syllable words and veiled untruths. We have lost the art of sarcasm with humor. Thanks for sharing this.

lvstephanie

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #5 on: January 09, 2012, 07:26:27 am »
I think the closest that the younger generation has to these are the "Yo' Mama so fat / ugly / stupid / etc." jokes... Those can have some good bits of sarcasm and/or word logic like these.... But they still miss some of that mental acuity that real gives these at caustic flavor.

falcon9

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #6 on: January 09, 2012, 12:39:50 pm »
I think the closest that the younger generation has to these are the "Yo' Mama so fat / ugly / stupid / etc." jokes... Those can have some good bits of sarcasm and/or word logic like these.... But they still miss some of that mental acuity that real gives these at caustic flavor.



Possibly so however, I did hear one young person tell another that "if stupid were bricks, you'd be your own projects".  Even the other guy laughed.
One can lead a horse to water however, if one holds the horse's head under, that horse will drown.

             

ptfunds

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #7 on: January 09, 2012, 02:15:35 pm »
Nice list, I enjoyed reading them. I would suggest that if young people aren't eloquent in their way of expressing themselves that perhaps we, as the older generation, have been part of that. Even if we aren't of the group that use 4 letter words to express ourselves, perhaps we have not been as eloquent as we might have been in teaching other expressions. It is often interesting to me that the younger generations are pointed at....since we have been their teachers who is to blame?

Joeyramone

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Re: When Insults Had Class
« Reply #8 on: January 09, 2012, 03:33:51 pm »
The best insult about class is from the old TV show, 'Fat Albert'.

Fat Albert - That dude is like a teacher in the summertime.
Rudy - How's that, Fat Albert?
Fat Albert - He's got no class.


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