The Little Book of Funny Quotations is compiled from reflections of some of the most brilliant minds of the past and present. From the deeply philosophical assertions of Ambros Bierce and Mark Twain, wrapped as they often are in a sweetener of humour, and the acidic but enviable wit of Oscar Wilde, with his outrageous and audacious statements, to the sharply observed social commentary of more writers like P.J. O’Rourke, Bill Bryson and Fran Lebowitz.

There is also a delicious mix of the best of the badinage of Noel Coward, the barbed ripostes of Groucho Marx, the slightly off-the-wall and terribly English humour of P.G. Wodehouse (“Ice formed on the Butler’s upper slopes”), and the dry repartee of Sir Winston Churchill, to name but a few. All have been left to posterity – what a gift!

This book is a dip into and perhaps from which to steal a few lines to drop into conversation or to use as a deft retort when our own wit fails us. And why not? In the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Next to the originator of good sentence is the first quoter of it”; and although we won’t be first, we certainly won’t be the last.

hardback