“The weakness of art is that great poems do not ennoble politics, as they certainly should, and the trouble with politics is that they inspire poets only to mockery and scorn.”

Something About a Soldier (1940)

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William Saroyan190

American writer 1908–1981

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Apparently attributed to Marx in Bennett Cerf's Try and Stop Me, first published in 1944. A citation of this can been seen in the Kentucky New Era on November 9, 1964 http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=X-orAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ZWcFAAAAIBAJ&pg=4581,3323702&dq=art-of-looking-for-trouble&hl=en. Also attributed to Marx by Rand Paul in "The Long Stand," ch. 1 of Taking a Stand: Moving Beyond Partisan Politics to Unite America (New York, N. Y.: Center Street, 26 May 2015), p. 5. <br class="br">The original quotation belongs to Sir Ernest Benn (Henry Powell Spring, What is Truth?, Orange Press, 1944, p. 31 https://books.google.com/books?id=snxbAAAAMAAJ&q=Ernest+benn+%22Politics+is+the+art+of%22&dq=Ernest+benn+%22Politics+is+the+art+of%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAjgUahUKEwiK3Zm-qojIAhWGVZIKHdFYBqY); a first known citation reportedly appears in the Springfield (MA) Republican on July 27, 1930. <br class="br">Misattributed <br class="br">Variant: Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies. <br class="br">Source: Gyles Brandreth, Word Play: A cornucopia of puns, anagrams and other contortions and curiosities of the English language, Coronet, 2015.

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“The weakness of art is that great poems do not ennoble politics, as they certainly should, and the trouble with politics is that they inspire poets only to mockery and scorn.”

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William Saroyan190

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