“How many times had those awful words - "I know what I'm doing" - been uttered throughout history as prelude to disaster?”

— Christopher Buckley , Supreme Courtship

Source: Supreme Courtship

Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "How many times had those awful words - "I know what I'm doing" - been uttered throughout history as prelude to disaster?" by Christopher Buckley?

Christopher Buckley photo

Christopher Buckley 2

American writer 1952

Related quotes

“Since Deacon Hollingshead’s arrival in town last July the Dominion had been hard at work, cleansing New York City of moral corruption.
“Corruption” is a popular word with the enthusiasts of the Dominion, usually uttered as a prelude to the knife, the docket, or the noose.”

Robert Charles Wilson book Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America

Source: Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America (2009), p. 317

“There have been times throughout American history where what is right is not the same as what is legal. Sometimes to do the right thing you have to break the law.”

Edward Snowden (1983) American whistleblower and former National Security Agency contractor

Snowden's first U.S. television interview, to NBC's Brian Williams; Snowden: "Sometimes To Do The Right Thing You Have to Break a Law", Gawker (29 May 2014) http://gawker.com/snowden-sometimes-to-do-the-right-thing-you-have-to-b-1583145785

“History has rewritten itself so many times I'm not really sure how it was to begin with -- it's a bit like trying to guess the original color of a wall when it's been repainted eight times.”

Jasper Fforde book Something Rotten

Source: Something Rotten

“We are so used to releasing words, we don't know what to do with them if they stay. No matter how many times we let them go, they come back. The words that matter always stay.”

David Levithan The Realm of Possibility

Source: The Realm of Possibility

“I'm obviously not orthodox, I don't know how many real poets have ever been orthodox.”

R.S. Thomas (1913–2000) Welsh poet

"R. S. Thomas in conversation with Molly Price-Owen." in The David Jones Journal R. S. Thomas Special Issue (Summer/Autumn 2001)

“Throughout the history of Christianity, there had been a core of belief that man was not doomed to be everlastingly corrupt.”

Pierre Stephen Robert Payne (1911–1983) British lecturer, novelist, historian, poet and biographer

The Romantic Agony, p. 158
The Corrupt Society - From Ancient Greece To Present-Day America (1975)

“Werther had a love for Charlotte
Such as words could never utter;
Would you know how first he met her?
She was cutting bread and butter.”

William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–1863) novelist

Sorrows of Werther, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

“I wanted my own words. But the ones I use have been dragged through I don't know how many consciences.”

Jean Paul Sartre book The Wall

Source: The Wall

“I usually work in a direction until I know how to do it, then I stop. At the time that I am bored or understand — I use those words interchangeably — another appetite has formed.”

Robert Rauschenberg (1925–2008) American artist

Quoted in: Wendy Richmond (2009), Art Without Compromise, p. 136
21st Century

“France and the whole of Europe have a great culture and an amazing history. Most important thing, though, is that people there know how to live! In America they've forgotten all about it. I'm afraid that the American culture is a disaster.”

Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician

Related topics