“The personal comparative is marked by epigrammatic self-satire. It implies that everyone thinks himself better than anyone else, but only the egoist says so.”
Humorous English, p91
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Evan Esar 11
American writer 1899–1995Related quotes
“I do not try to dance better than anyone else. I only try to to dance better than myself.”
Playboy interview (2003)
Context: I think it's a very confused culture. On the one hand, no one is better than anyone else; no one is prettier. On the other hand, everyone is completely obsessed by their looks and by how they strike the world. On the one hand, we're all equal; on the other hand, everyone's a superstar. It's all very irrational, like all ideology.
[John Sears, RTNDA Communicator, RTNDA; The Association; Radio Television Digital News Association; Volume 54, August 2000, Interview with Ed Bradley]
“My goal is not to be better than anyone else, but to be better than I used to be.”
Variant: you don't need to be better than any one else you just need to be better than you used to be
Section 1.9 <!-- p. 28 -->
The Crosswicks Journal, A Circle of Quiet (1972)
Context: My husband is my most ruthless critic. … Sometimes he will say, "It's been said better before." Of course. It's all been said better before. If I thought I had to say it better than anyone else, I'd never start. Better or worse is immaterial. The thing is that it has to be said; by me; ontologically. We each have to say it, to say it in our own way. Not of our own will, but as it comes through us. Good or bad, great or little: that isn't what human creation is about. It is that we have to try; to put it down in pigment, or words, or musical notations, or we die.
Source: Norwegian Wood (1987)
Illusions : The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah (1977)