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Will Cuppy

111 quotes

“Borrowing has a bad name, but you would be surprised how it helps in a pinch.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I borrow to pay my honest debts and not to squander foolishly. What's more, I confine my borrowing to those who can well afford it. I don't go around sponging on widows and orphans unless they have plenty.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I think you are absolutely right about everything, except I think humor springs from rage, hay fever, overdue rent and miscellaneous hell.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) first seen 1936 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From a letter to Max Eastman, 1936, about Eastman's book, The Enjoyment of Laughter (reprint). Eastman mss., Lilly Library, Indiana University, Bloomington.
“I hear so many things about who I am supposed to be I hardly know what to believe. I am willing to tell all, but what Is it? Doubtless all these myths and legends will be straightened out eventually, but It may take years.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) first seen 1929 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Comic interview with Jo Ranson, "Living from Can to Mouth," Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Brooklyn Eagle Magazine, November 24, 1929, p. 5.
“I am billed as a humorist, but of course I am a tragedian at heart.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) first seen 1942 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Stanley J. Kunitz and Howard Haycraft (eds.), Twentieth Century Authors, New York: H.W. Wilson Company, 1942, p. 342.
“I only know that all is lost, and that nothing can help me unless I inherit money, strike oil or go to work.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Ah, well! We live and learn, or, anyway, we live.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Modern Man or Nervous Wreck is the highest of all mammals because anyone can see that he is. There are about 2,000,000,000 Modern Men, or too many. The Modern Man's highly developed brain has made him what he is and you know what he is. [Footnote: It is because of his brain that he has risen above the animals. Guess which animals he has risen above.]”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:]Each male has from 2 to 790 females with whom he discusses current events. Of these he marries from 3 to 17.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All Modern Men are descended from a Wormlike creature but it shows more on some people.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Aristotle described the Crow as chaste. In some departments of knowledge, Aristotle was too innocent for his own good.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Male penguins are unfaithful up to an advanced age, a phenomenon sometimes attributed to the sea air.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] The Dotterel weighs only four ounces. It has long been a scientific riddle how so much wrong-headedness can manage to exist in so small a space. Still, there's the Least Gnatcatcher.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Other foolish birds include the Semipalmated Plover, the Marbled Godwit, the Carolina Mosshead, the Tasmanian Googlenose and the Fool Hen or Franklin Grouse of the Rockies.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To the seeing eye life is mostly Sparrows.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The male is colored much more gorgeously than the female so that he can be shot and made into feather embroidery.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Much still remains to be learned about his sex life because the Hummingbird is quicker than the eye.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Aristotle maintains that the neck of the Lion is composed of a single bone. Aristotle knew nothing at all about Lions, a circumstance which did not prevent him from writing a good deal on the subject.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] To give the Beaver his due, he does things because he has to do them, not because he believes that hard work per se will somehow make him a better Beaver -- the Beaver may be dumb, but he is not that dumb! The Beaver was made to gnaw, and gnaw he does. There you have him in a nutshell.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Pliny the Elder described a Whale called "Balaena or Whirlpool, which is so long and broad as to take up more in length and breadth than two acres of ground." This brings up again the old question: Are the classics doomed? Our ancestors believed that four years of this sort of information would inevitably produce a President, or at least a Cabinet Member. It didn't seem to work out that way.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Zebra is striped all over so that the Lion can see him and eat him. Some people say he is striped so that the Lion can not see him. These people believe that the stripes of the Zebra simulate the bars of sunlight falling through the tall jungle grasses and that therefore the Zebra is invisible and that the earth is flat.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The father guards the nest and fans it with his pectoral fins until the children are able to shift for themselves. Then he eats them. [Footnote: He does this because of his altruistic (parental) instinct. The higher one rises in the vertebrate scale the more altruistic one becomes. The higher vertebrates are just one mass of altruism.]”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Even as a child back in Indiana, whenever I took a Butterbelly off the hook I used to ask myself, "Does this fish think?" I would even ask others, "Do you suppose this Butterbelly can think?" And all I would get in reply was a look. At the age of eighteen, I left the state.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] The female of any species is generally regarded as a relatively anabolic organism, more passive than the male, who is relatively katabolic and active. The fact remains that one frequently runs across a rather katabolic female.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] The head of a Pike, served at supper, is said to have caused the death from terror of Theodoric the Goth, who imagined the fish's features to be those of Symmachus, a man he had just killed. But for this story, we of today would have no idea what Symmachus looked like.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As Darwin puts it in The Descent of Man, "Male snakes, though appearing so sluggish, are amorous." Isn't that just like Darwin? It was one of his main ideas, you know, that the males of almost all animals have stronger passions than the females. Since then we've learned a thing or two. At any rate, the female snake is right there when spring arrives in the woods.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] We have no Common Vipers in the United States, but we have worse.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Other countries may boast of this and that, but nobody can touch the United States for poisonous snakes. We have about twenty species, most of them deadly, and Europe has only five or six, none of them much good. We have fifteen kinds of Rattlesnakes alone and nobody else has even one. [Footnote: There is a species in Central and South America, but it probably came from here.]”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] A few Cobras in your home will soon clear it of Rats and Mice. Of course, you will still have the Cobras.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Most people erroneously call this snake the Puff Adder, Beach Adder, or Blowing Viper. So, naturally, they kill it.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If you annoy the Hog-nosed Snake enough, he will roll over on his back and play dead. If you turn him right-side up, he will roll over to prove that he is dead. [Footnote:] While he is playing dead, you can go straight up to him and step on his head or smash him with a big club.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] The Chameleon's face reminded Aristotle of a Baboon. Aristotle wasn't much of a looker himself.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Three million alligators were killed in Florida between 1880 and 1900. Goody!”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Age of Reptiles ended because it had gone on long enough and it was all a mistake in the first place. A better day was dawning at the close of the Mesozoic Era. There were some little warm-blooded animals around which had been stealing and eating the eggs of the Dinosaurs, and they were gradually learning to steal other things, too. Civilization was just around the corner.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“During the Cretaceous Period many of the inland seas dried up, leaving the Plesiosaurs stranded without any fish. Just about that time Mother Nature scrapped the whole Age of Reptiles and called for a new deal. And you can see what she got. [Footnote: Here we see the working of another Law of Nature: No water, no fish.]”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We do not really know why the Woolly Mammoth became extinct. Early Man killed some of them, of course. But most of the time Early Man stayed right in his cave, holding hands with Early Woman. I wouldn't know what the Woolly Mammoth did about that sort of thing. Not nearly enough, I suspect.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Dodo never had a chance. He seems to have been invented for the sole purpose of becoming extinct and that was all he was good for.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] An Ant on a hot stove-lid runs faster than an Ant on a cold one. Who wouldn't?”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Ancient Egyptians considered it good luck to meet a swarm of Bees on the road. What they considered bad luck I couldn't say.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Then there's the law that any person found carrying a Swanhook, the same being neither a Swanherd in good standing nor accompanied by two certified Swanherds, or Swannerds (or Swanners, or Swanmasters), of known probity, should cough up thirteen shillings fourpence, three shillings fourpence going to the informer and the rest to the King. This looked like a fine bit of legislation until it developed that you can't collect from such people. They haven't got it. That's why they're out stealing Swans.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Footnote:] Pliny the Elder perished in 79 A.D. when he refused to flee from the great eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, insisting that everything would be all right. It wasn't.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Egypt has been called the Gift of the Nile. Once every year the river overflows its banks, depositing a layer of rich alluvial soil on the parched ground. Then it recedes and soon the whole countryside, as far as the eye can reach, is covered with Egyptologists.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Egyptians of the First Dynasty were already civilized in most respects. They had hieroglyphics, metal weapons for killing foreigners, numerous government officials, death, and taxes.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Although this structure [the Great Pyramid of Giza] failed as a tomb, it is one of the wonders of the world even today because it is the largest thing ever built for the wrong reason.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“He [Khufu] had discovered the fact that if you tell somebody to do something, nine times out of ten he will do it.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[About experts' disbelief that Egyptians could build pyramids] It hardly seems possible that the ancient Egyptians were as smart as these experts. Still, they went right ahead and did it, and you can draw your own conclusions.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The fact is that building a pyramid is fairly easy, aside from the lifting. You just pile up stones in receding layers, placing one layer carefully upon another, and pretty soon you have a pyramid. You can't help it. In other words, it is not in the nature of a pyramid to fall down. [Footnote: It probably could not fall down if it tried.]”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Egyptologists say they have no idea what Khufu was doing when he was not building pyramids, since he left no inscriptions describing his daily activities, and they would give a good deal to know. Then they say he had six wives and a harem full of concubines. They do not seem to make the connection, but you get it and I get it. We do not need any hieroglyphics to inform us that Khufu dropped around occasionally to see how things were getting along and to tell the ladies how many cubic yards of limestone he had laid that afternoon.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“He [Thutmose III] went to Asia with his army and killed the natives to his heart's content, and stole so much of their goods that Egypt was rolling in wealth for quite a while. Thutmose III was thus one of the earliest exponents of internationalism, or going into other countries and slaughtering the inhabitants.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“They [Xanthippus, Aristides the Just, and Themistocles] all won lasting renown by constantly accusing one another of peculation and fraud and calling names at election time.”
Will Cuppy (1884–1949) said by 1949 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source