A Stainless Steel Rat is Born (1985)
The Stainless Steel Rat
Context: We must be as stealthy as rats in the wainscoting of their society. It was easier in the old days, of course, and society had more rats when the rules were looser, just as old wooden buildings have more rats than concrete buildings. But there are rats in the building now as well. Now that society is all ferrocrete and stainless steel there are fewer gaps in the joints. It takes a very smart rat indeed to find these openings. Only a stainless steel rat can be at home in this environment.
“Anyone can rat, but it takes a certain amount of ingenuity to re-rat.”
Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Remark in 1923 after rejoining the Conservatives, having left them earlier to join the Liberals; reported in Kay Halle, Irrepressible Churchill (1966), p. 52–53. Other sources say this remark was made in 1924.
Early career years (1898–1929)
“You can win the rat race but you're still a rat.”
Banksy pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, and painter
Wall and Piece (2005)
“Rats in paradise! Rats in paradise!”
Nick Cave (1957) Australian musician
Song lyrics, Mutiny (1993), Mutiny in Heaven
Peter Gabriel (1950) English singer-songwriter, record producer and humanitarian
Shock The Monkey
Song lyrics, Peter Gabriel (IV), Security (1982)
“They are very dangerous, but we exterminate them like rats.”
Jusuf Prazina (1962–1993) Bosnian mobster
On Serb snipers in the siege of Sarajevo. http://www.bhdani.com/arhiva/259/t25905.shtml <br class="br">Unsourced
“If you join the rat race — you're in the race of rats.”
Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) German poet, playwright, theatre director
“Hating people is like burning down your own home to get rid of a rat.”
Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878–1969) American pastor
As I See Religion (1932)
Variant: Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.
“Not forgiving is like drinking rat poison, and then waiting around for the rat to die.”
Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist
Traveling Mercies
Source: Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
