”I have no idea what kind of idiot you are,” Miss Jesczenka said. “That’s why I’m asking.”
Source: The Hidden Goddess (2011), Chapter 8, “Chaos and Disorder” (p. 133)
Source: The Hidden Goddess (2011), Chapter 8, “Chaos and Disorder” (p. 133)
“B: What do you think what a person I am?”
"The role of the character initiating the proposal in this anecdote has been assigned to George Bernard Shaw, Winston Churchill, Groucho Marx, Mark Twain, W. C. Fields, Bertrand Russell, H.G. Wells, Woodrow Wilson and others. However, the earliest example of this basic story found by QI did not spotlight any of the persons just listed [...]
[...] QI hypothesizes that this anecdote began as a fictional tale that was intended to be humorous with an edge of antagonism. The story was retold for decades. Famous men were substituted into the role of the individual making the proposition. Occasionally, the individual who received the proposition was also described as famous, but typically she remained unidentified.
[...] In January 1937 the syndicated newspaper columnist O. O. McIntyre printed a version of the anecdote that he says was sent to him as a newspaper clipping. This tale featured a powerful Canadian-British media magnate and politician named Max Aitken who was also referred to as Lord Beaverbrook [MJLB]":
Someone sends me a clipping from Columnist Lyons with this honey:
“They are telling this of Lord Beaverbrook and a visiting Yankee actress. In a game of hypothetical questions, Beaverbrook asked the lady: ‘Would you live with a stranger if he paid you one million pounds?’ She said she would. ‘And if be paid you five pounds?’ The irate lady fumed: ‘Five pounds. What do you think I am?’ Beaverbrook replied: ‘We’ve already established that. Now we are trying to determine the degree.”
Quote investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/03/07/haggling/ cited 2013-07-10
Misattributed
On the threat of violence in “Meena Kandasamy interview: ‘I don’t know if I’m idiotic – or courageous’” https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/meena-kandasamy-interview-i-don-t-know-if-i-m-idiotic-or-courageous-9238644.html in the Independent (2014 Apr 6)
Source: Space Cadet (1948), Chapter 16 “P.R.S. Astarte”, p. 195
As quoted in Hope Solo: 'I speak the truth, and people either love me or they hate me'" http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlesports/2012/08/29/hope-solo-i-speak-the-truth-and-people-either-love-me-or-they-hate-me/#6489101=0, seattlepi.com (August 29, 2012)
2010s
Message to usability@gnome.org mailing list, 2005-12-12, 2006-08-28, Torvalds, Linus http://mail.gnome.org/archives/usability/2005-December/msg00021.html,
2000s, 2005
