Quotes about cork (28 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“Life and experience. If one notices how some individuals know how to treat their experiences (their insignificant everyday experiences) so that these become a plot of ground that bears fruit three times a year; while others (and how many of them!) are driven through the waves of the most exciting turns of fate, of the most varied currents of their time or nation, and yet always stay lightly on the surface, like cork: then one is finally tempted to divide mankind into a minority (minimality) of those people who know how to make much out of little and a majority of those who know how to make a little out of much; indeed, one meets those perverse wizards who, instead of creating the world out of nothing, create nothing out of the world.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Human, All Too Human

Section IX, "Man Alone with Himself" / aphorism 627
Human, All Too Human (1878), Helen Zimmern translation

Life , Fate , People , World

“Describing her first day back in grade school after a long absence, a teacher said, "It was like trying to hold 35 corks under water at the same time."”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Incorrectly attributed to Twain, this is actually a quotation from an article in The Pocono Record (18 February 1971, page 4 http://www.newspapers.com/newspage/40447792/)
Misattributed

School , Teachers , Water , Time

“Some contemptible scoundrel stole the cork from my lunch …”

W.C. Fields (1880–1946) actor

You Can't Cheat an Honest Man (1940)

“His heart danced upon her movements like a cork upon a tide. He heard what her eyes said to him from beneath their cowl and knew that in some dim past, whether in life or revery, he had heard their tale before.”

James Joyce book A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Source: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Life , Past , Heart , Dance

“I sleep better knowing that a naked cork-eater is not sneaking around at night, stealing my underwear.”

Maureen Johnson (1973) writer from the USA

Source: The Bermudez Triangle

Sleep , Night

“By insisting on having your bottle pointing to the north when the cork is being drawn, and calling the waiter Max, you may induce an impression on your guests which hours of laboured boasting might be powerless to achieve. For this purpose, however, the guests must be chosen as carefully as the wine.”

Saki The Chronicles of Clovis

"The Chaplet"
The Chronicles of Clovis (1911)

Wine

“[About the Swiss] The nice Germans, Yeah. Or as they like to say, the other white race. Now, I have only one question. How can you trust an army, how butch is an army that has a wine opener on its knife? "Many of you have never opened Chardonnay under fire! First, you pull the cork out, sniff it, say, 'Meat or fish?', and throw! (Military cadence) I don't know, but I've been told, Chardonnay must be served cold! Ja!"”

Robin Williams (1951–2014) American actor and stand-up comedian

Robin Williams: Live on Broadway (2002)

Question , Fish , Wine

“He is not, as he forcibly remarks, ‘one of those fortunate men who, if they were to dive under one side of a barge stark–naked, would come up on the other with a new suit of clothes on, and a ticket for soup in the waistcoat–pocket:’ neither is he one of those, whose spirit has been broken beyond redemption by misfortune and want. He is just one of the careless, good–for–nothing, happy fellows, who float, cork–like, on the surface, for the world to play at hockey with: knocked here, and there, and everywhere: now to the right, then to the left, again up in the air, and anon to the bottom, but always reappearing and bounding with the stream buoyantly and merrily along.”

Charles Dickens book Sketches by Boz

Our Parish, Ch. 5 : The Broker’s Man
Sketches by Boz (1836-1837)

Men , World , Clothes , Hockey

“Anthony Lynch, the Cork corner-back, will be the last person to let you down - his people are undertakers.”

Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh (1930) Gaelic games commentator

Famous quotes, Miscellaneous

People , Personality

“We have observed for thirty centuries that a large nose is a sign on the door of our face that says 'Herein dwells a man who is intelligent, prudent, courteous, affable, noble-minded and generous'. A small nose is a cork on the bottle of the opposite vices.”

Cyrano de Bergerac (1619–1655) French novelist, dramatist, scientist and duelist

The Other World (1657)

Intelligence

“I have no idea whether my grandfather took notice of everything in it, or nothing. If he believed at all, he was just like those theologians who store their theology somewhere in a locked compartment of the brain, or rather, perhaps, like those travelers who carry a bottle of iodine in their luggage and take care to keep it tightly corked in case it leaks and ruins their belongings. To be honest, I think my grandfather Björn of Brekkukot would not have been significantly different if he had lived here in Iceland in pagan times, or if his home had been somewhere in the world where people never read from Vídalín's Book of Sermons but believed instead in the bull Apis, or the god Ra, or the bird Colibri.... "A Bible that costs half a hen? Pshaw!"”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

Brekkukotsannáll (The Fish Can Sing) (1957)

God , People , Books , World

“Decade Blending: In clothing: the indiscriminate combination of two or more items from various decades to create a personal mood: Sheila = Mary Quant earrings (1960s) + cork wedgie platform shoes (1970s) + black leather jacket (1950s and 1980s).”

Douglas Coupland (1961) Canadian novelist, short story writer, playwright, and graphic designer

Definitions

Shoe , Mood , Personality , Clothes

““Ah, books.” Ziegler, smiling, came up behind me. “They bob like corks on an ocean. Float between worlds, messages in bottles.””

Robert Charles Wilson (1953) author

Divided by Infinity (p. 179)
The Perseids and Other Stories (2000)

Books , World , Smile

“There's no pleasure i' living if you're to be corked up for ever, and only dribble your mind out by the sly, like a leaky barrel.”

George Eliot book Adam Bede

Adam Bede (1859)

Pleasure

“It was in the year 1843 that I read a paper "On the Calorific Effects of Magneto-Electricity and the Mechanical Value of Heat" to the Chemical Section of the British Association assembled at Cork. With the exception of some eminent men, among whom I recollect with pride Dr. Apjohn, the president of the Section, the Earl of Rosse, Mr. Eaton Hodgkinson, and others, the subject did not excite much general attention; so that when I brought it forward again at the meeting in 1847, the chairman suggested that, as the business of the section pressed, I should not read my paper, but confine myself to a short verbal description of my experiments. This I endeavoured to do, and discussion not being invited, the communication would have passed without comment if a young man had not risen in the section, and by his intelligent observations created a lively interest in the new theory. The young man was William Thomson, who had two years previously passed the University of Cambridge with the highest honour, and is now probably the foremost scientific authority of the age.”

James Prescott Joule (1818–1889) English physicist and brewer

[James Prescott Joule, Joint Scientific Papers, The Physical Society of London, 1887, 215]

Men , Age , Intelligence , Communication

“Nor is this kind of Texture peculiar to Cork onely; for upon examination with my Microscope, I have found that the pith of an Elder, or almost any other Tree, the inner pulp or pith of the Cany hollow stalks of several other Vegetables: as of Fennel, Carrets, Daucus, Bur-docks, Teasels, Fearn, some kinds of Reeds &c., have much such a kind of Schematisme, as I have lately shewn that of Cork, save onely that here the pores are rang'd the long-ways, or the same ways with the length of the Cane, whereas in Cork they are transverse.
The pith also that fills that part of the stalk of a Feather that is above the Quil, has much such a kind of texture, save onely that which way foever I set this light substance, the pores seem'd to be cut transversly, so that I guess this pith which fills the Feather, not to consist of abundance of long pores separated with Diaphragms, as Cork does, but to be a kind of solid or hardned froth, or a congeries of very small bubbles consolidated in that form, into a pretty stiff as well as tough concrete, and that each Cavern, Bubble, or Cell, is distinctly separate from any of the rest, without any kind of hole in the encompassing films, so that I could no more blow through a piece of this kinde of substance, then I could through a piece of Cork, or the found pith of an Elder.”

Robert Hooke book Micrographia

Micrographia (1667) p. 115

Way , Tree , Light , Parting

“Characters — conventional women with minor eccentricities — flourished in our world, as Mrs. Cork had no doubt observed. But she'd failed to notice that the characters were all old, rich and pedigreed. Newcomers, especially those of moderate means, were expected to form an attractive but featureless chorus behind our few madcap divas.”

Edmund White book A Boy's Own Story

Source: A Boy's Own Story (1982), Chapter One (p. 14).

Women , World

“Yahtzee was born in Warwickshire, England, on the day of the great storm of 1983. Twenty years later, when England had become too small to accommodate the five hundred kilometre-wide tumour growing out of the back of his neck, he moved to Brisbane, Australia, where a chance encounter with an enraged surfer caused the tumour to become detached. It has now gone on to star in a number of Japanese fetish videos, while Yahtzee occupies a treehouse on the edge of the city, struggling to learn how to live with corks around his hat. The enraged surfer tries to keep in touch, but Yahtzee never answers his phone.”

Ben Croshaw (1983) English video game journalist

About page http://www.fullyramblomatic.com/about.htm
Fully Ramblomatic

Star , Learning , Chance

“So with 'is 'ead down in a corner,
On 'is front paws 'e started to walk,
And 'e coughed and 'e sneezed and 'e gargled,
Till Albert shot out like a cork.

Old Wallace felt better direc'ly,
And 'is figure once more became lean,
But the only difference with Albert
Was 'is face and 'is 'ands were quite clean.”

Marriott Edgar (1880–1951) British poet

"The Return of Albert", line 21.
Albert, 'Arold and Others (1938)

“Smith corks one into right, down the line! It may go!! … Go crazy, folks! Go crazy! It's a home run, and the Cardinals have won the game, by the score of 3 to 2, on a home run by the Wizard! Go crazy!”

Jack Buck (1924–2002) American sportscaster

Calling Ozzie Smith's 9th inning home run off Niedenfuer in Game 5 of the 1985 National League Championship Series.
1980s

Home , Game

“Lighter than a cork I danced on the waves.”

Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1891) French Decadent and Symbolist poet

Plus léger qu'un bouchon j'ai dansé sur les flots.
St. 4
Le Bateau Ivre http://www.mag4.net/Rimbaud/poesies/Boat.html (The Drunken Boat) (1871)

Dance

“No matter how nearly perfect an Almost Perfect State may be, it is not nearly enough perfect unless the individuals who compose it can, somewhere between death and birth, have a perfectly corking time for a few years.”

Don Marquis (1878–1937) American writer

The Almost Perfect State (1921)
Context: No matter how nearly perfect an Almost Perfect State may be, it is not nearly enough perfect unless the individuals who compose it can, somewhere between death and birth, have a perfectly corking time for a few years. The most wonderful governmental system in the world does not attract us, as a system; we are after a system that scarcely knows it is a system; the great thing is to have the largest number of individuals as happy as may be, for a little while at least, some time before they die.

Death , Birth , Time , Perfection

“Now she took the sword back into her hand and knelt on the rim of the invisible blackness below. She had gone this path once before and once only, and never thought to find any necessity in life strong enough to drive her down again. The way was the strangest she had ever known. There was, she thought, no such passage in all the world save here. It had not been built for human feet to travel. It had not been built for feet at all. It was a narrow, polished shaft that cork-screwed round and round. A snake might have slipped in it and gone shooting down, round and round in dizzy circles—but no snake on earth was big enough to fill that shaft. No human travelers had worn the sides of the spiral so smooth, and she did not care to speculate on what creatures had polished it so, through what ages of passage.”

C. L. Moore (1911–1987) American author

Black God's Kiss (1934); pp. 9-10
Short fiction, Jirel of Joiry (1969)

Strong , Way , Age , World

“Dublin's a big city, so Cork is much smaller, people are very friendly. It's a nice place to be, a lovely city, but it wasn't in my trajectory. I was very happily doing a busy job in Dublin. I had a lot of things going on. It came totally out of the blue.”

Fintan Gavin (1966) Irish Roman Catholic prelate (born 1966)

Source: ‘Covid accelerated change in the Church’: Bishop of Cork and Ross on challenges and his vision for the future https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/arid-40771641.html (23 December 2021)

Business , People , Love

“REMEMBER OLD TIM QUILL

In the moneylenders’ offices
The clocks are standing still
As leading the workers here in Cork
Is our old man Tim Quill

Known for his eloquent oration
When he heads the Cork Trades Council
He devises every selfless action
For the welfare of the nation

In ’22 democracy
Was promised to us all
Yet if it wasn’t for the Co-op
That dream it would just fall

Some say his Friesian herd
Is the most prolific of the lot
Yet the needs of the most desperate
Quill has not forgot

Under the present order
We’re left with debt and slums
Until then we follow Timothy Quill
And his marchers’ fine ol’ drums”

Sean O'Connor

Primary source
Source: Scrap print from Irish Labour history group

Democracy , Dreams

“My employer is a miser
His approach has me nerved
He exports our cash abroad
While pay here is inadequate
And my eviction has been served

I joined the labour movement
To get a better deal
Life to-day is miserable
My dignity they did steal

We have some great leaders
To halt the perpetual darken
In Cork we have Quill
Tipp there’s O’Brien
And in Dublin we’ve Big Jim Larkin

That poor young lad in town
Factory smoke he’s been snortin’
Jolly good thing that in the Dáil
He has our man Bill Norton

My employer was a miser
His approach had me nerved
But thanks to the Knights of Labour
Justice has been served.”

Sean O'Connor

Primary source work
Source: Scrap print from Irish Labour history group

Life , Justice

“AN ANGRY ARMY COUNCIL
By ‘J. L’

The Constitution was enacted
Much to de Valera’s pride
However on the Army Council
Its dissatisfaction did not hide

From the published organs
To the gunmen on the run
They spread the message of their leaders
To each and everyone

In West Cork there is Tom Barry
A recent chief-of-staff
Who believes Republican ambitions
Have just been cut in half

Meanwhile we’ve our three Seans
Russell, Mitchell, and MacBride
Dwindling in numbers
It’s too late to pick a side

Russell’s talking to the Germans
MacBride fights in the courts
While Mitchell’s on the racecourse
Good horses he reports

An angry army council
Is fuming to the core
Feeling betrayed by the government
For not doing more”

J.L (1610–1666)

Source: Irish Republican Archives

Horse , Fight , Feeling

“The Women of Cumann na mBan

The struggle is a-fading
Drifting to history
Yet the importance of these women
Does not need persuading

In Belfast was Winnie Carney
Who worked for freedom’s gain
She was a trade unionist in Dublin
When Connolly was slain

Travelling the country
Was Bloxham from May-o
A magnificent orator
Her resignation was blow

We must mention Jen Wyse-Power
Once the president
She supported the Treaty
Which made everyone sour

It was the great Sorcha MacMahon
Moving to-and-from the Four Courts
Fundraising for dependants
And arranging the transports

Do not forget Maud Mitchell
The first Captain of the Midlands
The executive’s fine beauty
In Cork she gave commands

Of course, there was Maud Gonne
And Countess Markievicz
For many years great warriors
'Til on parliament they split

After many hours of conflict
Settles does the dust
Yet the ideals of these women
Carry on they must”

Unknown author

Dependency , History , Country , Support