Ogden Nash: Trending quotes (page 2)

"Fortunately"
Versus (1949)
Context: A young person is a person with nothing to learn
One who already knows that ice does not chill and fire does not burn...
It knows it can spend six hours in the sun on its first
day at the beach without ending up a skinless beet,
And it knows it can walk barefoot through the barn
without running a nail in its feet....
Meanwhile psychologists grow rich
Writing that the young are ones' should not
undermine the self-confidence of which.

Spring Song http://books.google.com/books?id=bkFLAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Listen+buds+it's+March+twenty+first+don't+you+know+enough+to+burst%22&pg=PA138#v=onepage
I'm a Stranger Here Myself (1938)
Context: Listen, buds, it's March twenty first;
Don't you know enough to burst?
Come on, birds, unlock your throats!
Come on, gardeners, shed your coats!

Many Long Years Ago (1945), Song To Be Sung by the Father of Infant Female Children
Context: A fig for embryo Lohengrins!
I'll open all his safety pins,
I'll pepper his powder, and salt his bottle,
And give him readings from Aristotle.
Sand for his spinach I'll gladly bring,
And Tabasco sauce for his teething ring.
Then perhaps he'll struggle through fire and water
To marry somebody else's daughter.

"Bankers Are Just Like Anybody Else, Except Richer"
I'm a Stranger Here Myself (1938)
Context: Most bankers dwell in marble halls,
Which they get to dwell in because they encourage deposits and discourage withdrawals,
And particularly because they all observe one rule which woe betides the banker who fails to heed it,
Which is you must never lend any money to anybody unless they don't need it.

I'm a Stranger Here Myself (1938), I Have It On Good Authority
Context: There are two kinds of people who blow through life like a breeze,
And one kind is gossipers, and the other kind is gossipees,
And they certainly annoy each other,
But they certainly enjoy each other,
Yes, they pretend to flout each other,
But they couldn't do without each other...

"The Terrible People"
Many Long Years Ago (1945)
Context: Perhaps indeed the possession of wealth is constantly distressing,
But I should be quite willing to assume every curse of wealth if I could at the same time assume every blessing.
The only incurable troubles of the rich are the troubles that money can't cure,
Which is a kind of trouble that is even more troublesome if you are poor.
Certainly there are lots of things in life that money won't buy, but it's very funny —
Have you ever tried to buy them without money?

"Everybody Tells Me Everything" in The Face Is Familiar (1940)
Context: Just when you think that at least the outlook is so black that it can grow no blacker, it worsens,
And that is why I do not like the news, because there has never been an era when so many things were going so right for so many of the wrong persons.

Commencement address at his daughter Linell's boarding school, as quoted http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/05/AR2005050501359_pf.html in The Washington Post (8 May 2005)
Context: Among other things I think humor is a shield, a weapon, a survival kit... So here we are several billion of us, crowded into our global concentration camp for the duration. How are we to survive? Solemnity is not the answer, any more than witless and irresponsible frivolity is. I think our best chance lies in humor, which in this case means a wry acceptance of our predicament. We don't have to like it but we can at least recognize its ridiculous aspects, one of which is ourselves.

"The Fly"
Good Intentions (1942)
Variant: God in his wisdom made me fly, and then forgot to tell me why.

"A Word to Husbands" in Marriage Lines (1964)

Source: "Reflections on Ice-Breaking" in Hard Lines (1931); this statement is often misattributed to Dorothy Parker.

"Let's Not Climb the Washington Monument Tonight"
Versus (1949)

Good Intentions (1942), Seeing Eye to Eye is Believing

"Baby, What Makes the Sky Blue?"