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W. S. Gilbert

72 quotes

“A popular speaker, however unpopular and insignificant, has only to wind up his speech with half-a-dozen lines of Shakespeare (and to make it clearly understood that they are Shakespeare's) and he will sit down amid thunders of applause.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) first seen 1882 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Unappreciated Shakespeare", Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, Christmas Number, 9 December 1882.
“So I fell in love with a rich attorney's Elderly, ugly daughter.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) first seen 1875 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1875, also quoted in Dictionary of Quotations, p. 353 (2005)
“She may very well pass for forty three In the dusk with the light behind her.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) first seen 1875 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1875, also quoted in Dictionary of Quotations, p. 353 (2005)
“But I submit, my lord, with all submission, To marry two at once is Burglaree!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Oh! my name is John Wellington Wells, I'm a dealer in magic and spells, In blessings and curses And ever-filled purses, In prophecies, witches, and knells. If you want a proud foe to "make tracks"— If you'd melt a rich uncle in wax— You've but to look in On our resident Djinn, Number seventy, Simmery Axe!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Or you or I must yield up his life to Ahrimanes. I would rather it were you.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“From such a face and form as mine, the noblest sentiments sound like the black utterances of a depraved imagination! It's human nature! I'm resigned.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What, never? / No, never! / What, never? / Well, hardly ever!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Things are seldom what they seem; Skim milk masquerades as cream.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Now landsmen all, whoever you may be, If you want to rise to the top of the tree, If your soul isn't fettered to an office stool, Be careful to be guided by this golden rule— Stick close to your desks and never go to sea, And you all may be Rulers of the Queen's Navee.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am the monarch of the sea, The Ruler of the Queen's Navee, Whose praise Great Britain loudly chants And we are his sisters, and his cousins, and his aunts!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) first seen 1878 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1878, HMS Pinafore, act 1, also quoted in Dictionary of Quotations, p. 353 (2005)
“When I was a lad I served a term As office boy to an attorney's firm. I cleaned the wndows and I swept the floor, And I polished up the handle of the big front door. I polished up that handle so carefullee That now I am the Ruler of the Queen's Navee!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) first seen 1878 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1878, HMS Pinafore, act 2, also quoted in Dictionary of Quotations, p. 353-354 (2005)
“In spite of all temptations To belong to other nations, He remains an Englishman!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) first seen 1878 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1878, HMS Pinafore, act 2, also quoted in Dictionary of Quotations, p. 354 (2005)
“The last three ships we took proved to be manned entirely by orphans, and so we had to let them go. One would think that Great Britain’s mercantile navy was recruited solely from her orphan asylums – which we know is not the case.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When your process of extermination begins, let our deaths be as swift and painless as you can conveniently make them.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No, Frederic, it cannot be. I don’t think much of our profession, but, contrasted with respectability, it is comparatively honest.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Against our wills, papa—against our wills!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Exactly – you said "often" ('frequently') only once.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Oh, dry the glistening tear That dews that martial cheek; Thy loving children hear, In them thy comfort seek. With sympathetic care Their arms around thee creep, For oh, they cannot bear To see their father weep!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Yes, but you don't go!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If you want a receipt for that popular mystery, Known to the world as a Heavy Dragoon - Take all the remarkable people in history, Rattle them off to a popular tune!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Art stopped short at the cultivated court of the Empress Josephine.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Then a sentimental passion of a vegetable fashion must excite your languid spleen, An attachment à la Plato for a bashful young potato, or a not-too-French French bean! Though the Philistines may jostle, you will rank as an apostle in the high aesthetic band, If you walk down Piccadilly with a poppy or a lily in your medieval hand.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Yes, I am the Apostle of Simplicity. I am called Archibald the All-Right, for I am infallible.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Archibald: To understand this, it is not necessary to think of anything at all. Saphir: Let us think of nothing at all!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I know what love is. There was a happy time when I didn't, but bitter experience has taught me.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A pallid and thin young man, A haggard and lank young man, A greenery-yallery, Grosvenor Gallery, Foot-in-the-grave young man!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Law is the true embodiment Of everything that’s excellent. It has no kind of fault or flaw, And I, my Lords, embody the Law.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The House of Peers, thoughout the war Did nothing in particular And did it very well.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Never, never, never, Faint heart never won fair lady! Nothing venture, nothing win – Blood is thick, but water’s thin – In for a penny, in for a pound – It's Love that makes the world go round!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I can tell a woman's age in half a minute — and I do!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“...Darwinian Man, though well-behav’d, At best is only a monkey shav’d!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Man is nature's sole mistake.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Ah pray, make no mistake, we are not shy; We're very wide awake, The moon and I!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am, in point of fact, a particularly haughty and exclusive person, of pre-Adamite ancestral descent. You will understand this when I tell you that I can trace my ancestry back to a protoplasmal primordial atomic globule. Consequently, my family pride is something inconceivable. I can’t help it. I was born sneering.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No money, no grovel! (Actually an ad-lib introduced by Rutland Barrington when playing the rôle of Pooh-Bah, to the annoyance of Gilbert.)”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“…in the first place, self decapitation is an extremely difficult, not to say dangerous, thing to attempt; and, in the second, it’s suicide, and suicide is a capital offence.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Pooh Bah: This professional conscientiousness is highly creditable to you, but it places us in a very awkward position. Koko: My good sir, the awkwardness of your position is grace itself compared with that of a man engaged in the act of cutting off his own head.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock, In a pestilential prison, with a life-long lock, Awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock, From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Koko is negotiating the terms by which he can behead Nanki-Poo in his place, and they involve letting the latter be married to his fiance until he is executed] Koko: But my position during the next month will be most unpleasant, most unpleasant! Nanki-Poo: Not nearly so unpleasant as mine at the end of it.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I have a left shoulder-blade that is a miracle of loveliness. People come miles to see it. My right elbow has a fascination that few can resist.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Ko-Ko: Well, a nice mess you've got us into, with your nodding head and the deference due to a man of pedigree! Pooh-Ba: Merely corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“...but it's an unjust world, and virtue is triumphant only in theatrical performances.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The idiot who praises, with enthusiastic tone, All centuries but this and every country but his own.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As someday it may happen that a victim must be found I've got a little list, I've got a little list Of society offenders who might well be underground, And who never would be missed—who never would be missed!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My object all sublime I shall achieve in time— To let the punishment fit the crime, The punishment fit the crime.”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I know a youth who loves a little maid— (Hey, but his face is a sight for to see!) Silent is he, for he's modest and afraid (Hey, but he's timid as a youth can be!)”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Some word that teems with hidden meaning, like "Basingstoke". It might recall me to my saner self. For, after all, I am only Mad Margaret! Daft Meg! Poor Meg! He! he! he!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My eyes are fully open to my awful situation, I shall go at once to Roderic and make him an oration, I shall tell him I've recovered my forgotten moral senses, and I don't care tuppence ha'penny for any consequences. Now I do not want to perish by the sword or by the dagger, but a martyr may indulge a little pardonable swagger And a word or two of compliment my vanity would flatter, but I've got to die to-morrow, so it really doesn't matter!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When maiden loves, she sits and sighs, She wanders to and fro - Unbidden tear-drops fill her eyes, And to all questions she replies With a sad "heigh ho!”
W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) said by 1911 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source