“There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

— Oscar Wilde, book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Variant: If there is anything more annoying in the world than having people talk about you, it is certainly having no one talk about you.
Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

Last update Sept. 27, 2023. History

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Oscar Wilde812

Irish writer and poet 1854–1900

Peg Bracken (1918–2007) American writer

But I Wouldn't Have Missed It for the World! The pleasures and perils of an unseasoned traveler (1973)

“Talk about the reality, about the facts, when to talk about children being killed, children of who? where? how? you're talking about propaganda, about media campaign, about sometimes fake pictures on the internet, we cannot talk but ones of the facts. We can talk about the facts, I cannot talk about allegations.”

Bashar al-Assad (1965) President of Syria

Interview with Bill Neely https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45odEv_1DAY (July 2016) on " NBC: Exclusive Interview with Bashar al-Assad https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/syria-s-president-bashar-al-assad-speaks-nbc-news-n608746"

“The only infallible rule we know is, that the man who is always talking about being a gentleman never is one.”

Robert Smith Surtees (1805–1864) English writer

Ask Mamma (1858) ch. 1

“There was constant talk about hewing things and ravaging things and splitting things asunder. Lots of big talk of things being mighty, and of things being riven, and of things being in thrall to other things, but very little attention given, as I now realise, to the laundry.”

Douglas Adams The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

Source: The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul (1988), Ch. 18

“Hollywood is like being nowhere and talking to nobody about nothing.”

Michelangelo Antonioni (1912–2007) Italian film director and screenwriter

Sunday Times [London] (20 June 1971)

“They [dogs] never talk about themselves but listen to you while you talk about yourself, and keep up an appearance of being interested in the conversation.”

Jerome K. Jerome (1859–1927) English humorist

“In fact, there’s probably only one thing worse than not being able to understand a person.”

James K. Morrow (1947) (1947-) science fiction author

“What’s that?” asked Nimrod.
“Being able to understand him completely.”
"Bible Stories for Adults, No. 20: The Tower" p. 76 (originally published in Author’s Choice Monthly #8: Swatting at the Cosmos)
Short fiction, Bible Stories for Adults (1996)

“The theme is what is being talked about, the point of departure for the clause as message”

Michael Halliday (1925–2018) Australian linguist

Source: 1970s and later, Cohesion in English (English Language), 1976, p. 212.
Context: The theme is what is being talked about, the point of departure for the clause as message, and the speaker has within certain limits the option of selecting any element in the clause as thematic.

“Dying is one of those things that can’t be fixed. Not by talking about it, not with all the brain surge in the world.”

Scott Westerfeld book Extras

Source: Extras

“Necessity resides in the way we talk about things, not in the things we talk about.”

Willard van Orman Quine (1908–2000) American philosopher and logician

Ways of Paradox and Other Essays (1976), p. 174
1970s

“There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

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