When Insults Had Class

There was a time when words were used beautifully. These glorious insults are from an era when cleverness with words was still valued, before a great portion of the English language was boiled down to four-letter words!

Lady Astor: “If you were my husband, I’d give you poison,”
Winston Churchill: “If you were my wife, I’d take it.”

Gladstone, a Member of Parliament, to Benjamin Disraeli:
“Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease.”
“That depends, sir,” said Disraeli, “On 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

“A modest l ittle person, with much to be modest about.”
— 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).

“Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words?”
— Ernest Hemingway (about William Faulkner)

“Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I’ll waste no time reading it.”
— Moses Hadas

“He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know.”
— Abraham Lincoln

“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

“There’s nothing wrong with you that reincarnation won’t cure.
— Jack E. Leonard

“He has the attention span of a lightning bolt.”
— Robert Redford

“They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge.”
— Thomas Brackett Reed

“In order to avoid bein g 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