Quotes about swing
page 2

Helen Reddy photo
Karen Armstrong photo

“When he died, he held fourteen baseball records, a little man with a bashful smile, a silken swing, baseball's legendary nice guy. His death was the worst that could have happened to baseball, but his playing career had been the best.”

Arnold Hano (1922) American writer

On Mel Ott, from "Nice Guy," in Greatest Giants of Them All (1967), p. 232; reprinted in Mel Ott: The Little Giant of Baseball https://books.google.com/books?id=5JlCbMNiWr0C&pg=PA192&dq=%22Arnold+Hano+wrote+feelingly%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAGoVChMI4Yfx7arUxwIViHA-Ch3J4wOi#v=onepage&q=%22Arnold%20Hano%20wrote%20feelingly%22&f=false (1999) by Fred Stein, p. 192
Sports-related

Dan Patrick photo

“The WHIIIIFFFF! (or The WHIIII… on check swings)”

Dan Patrick (1956) American sportscaster

Catch Phrases

Michael Elmore-Meegan photo
Babe Ruth photo
Timothy McVeigh photo

“ATF, all you tyrannical people will swing in the wind one day for your treasonous actions against the Constitution of the United States. Remember the Nuremberg War Trials.”

Timothy McVeigh (1968–2001) American army soldier, security guard, terrorist

As quoted in "Timothy McVeigh & Terry Nichols: Oklahoma Bombing" (2010), TruTv.

Andrew Gelman photo
Howie Rose photo
Alexandra Kollontai photo
Howie Rose photo
Jack Buck photo

“The Dodger right-hander is set and here's his pitch to Jack Clark. Swing and a long one into left field! Adios, goodbye, and maybe that's a winner! A three-run homer by Clark and the Cardinals lead by the score of 7 to 5 and they may go to the World Series on THAT one, folks!”

Jack Buck (1924–2002) American sportscaster

Calling Jack Clark's 9th inning three-run home run off Niedenfuer in Game 6 of the 1985 National League Championship Series to give the Cardinals the lead and the National League Pennant.
1980s

Joan Miró photo

“.. something as sensational as [a] heavy weight prize fight…. a rain of swings, uppercuts, and straight right and lefts to the stomach and everywhere throughout the entire event – a round lasting about twenty minutes. [remark on a ballet Miro planned to, c. 1930]”

Joan Miró (1893–1983) Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist

Quote of Miró in 'Bravo' Barcelona 1994; as cited in Calder Miro, ed. Elizabeth Hutton Turner / Oliver Wick; Philip Wilson Publishers, London 2004, p. 37
1915 - 1940

Paul Laurence Dunbar photo
Art Blakey photo
Miles Davis photo
Roberto Clemente photo
Daniel Lyons photo

“I still have no desire to own [an Apple Watch], or even any desire to go to the Apple store and look at one or hold one in my hand. … The only question, it seems to me, is this: At what point can Apple Watch be declared a swing and a miss?”

Daniel Lyons (1960) American writer

I can’t get excited about the Apple Watch http://goodreads.com/author_blog_posts/8481697-i-can-t-get-excited-about-the-apple-watch in Goodreads (3 June 2015)

Norman Mailer photo
George Soros photo
Sam Harris photo
Stanley Holloway photo

“As Sergeant walks past he was swinging his arms,
And he happened to brush against Sam,
And knocking his musket clean out of his hand,
It fell to the ground with a slam”

Stanley Holloway (1890–1982) English stage and film actor, comedian, singer, poet and monologist

Sam, Sam, Pick Oop Tha' Musket

Roberto Clemente photo

“I feel better now than I did at any time last season; the shoulder really hurt me bad last year. The left shoulder still gives me some trouble. It makes me swing differently. I have to adjust. Sometimes I find I'm over-cutting the ball. That is not my natural style. I used to swing and I just knew I could hit the ball hard. I knew when I could hit to right field, when I could pull. Now it's different. I have to force myself more than I ever did. Maybe it's because I'm getting old. Maybe.”

Roberto Clemente (1934–1972) Puerto Rican baseball player

Discussing two separate pre-season shoulder injuries, sustained, respectively, in February 1968 to the right shoulder, and in March 1969 to the left; as quoted in "A Sounder Clemente Has New Outlook; Buc Super Star May Play On and On" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=JFAOAAAAIBAJ&sjid=4H0DAAAAIBAJ&pg=7168,1534716 by Charley Feeney, in The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Tuesday, August 12, 1969), p. 18
Baseball-related, <big><big>1960s</big></big>, <big>1969</big>

Eddie Izzard photo
Jack Buck photo

“Sutter from the belt, to the plate…a swing and a miss! And that's a winner! That's a winner! A World Series winner for the Cardinals!”

Jack Buck (1924–2002) American sportscaster

Calling the last out of the :w:1982 World Series. Bruce Sutter struck out Gorman Thomas.
1980s

“All my work keeps going like a pendulum; it seems to swing back to something I was involved with earlier, or it moves between horizontality and verticality, circularity, or a composite of them. For me, I suppose that change is the only constant.”

Lee Krasner (1908–1984) American artist

Lee Krasner, ‎Marcia Tucker, ‎Whitney Museum of American Art (1973) Lee Krasner: large paintings. Nr. 33. p. 8.

Enoch Powell photo

“The House of Commons is at this moment being asked to agree to the renunciation of its own independence and supreme authority—but not the House of Commons by itself. The House of Commons is the personification of the people of Britain: its independence is synonymous with their independence; its supremacy is synonymous with their self-government and freedom. Through the centuries Britain has created the House of Commons and the House of Commons has moulded Britain, until the history of the one and the life of the one cannot be separated from the history and life of the other. In no other nation in the world is there any comparable relationship. Let no one therefore allow himself to suppose that the life-and-death decision of the House of Commons is some private affair of some privileged institution which at intervals swims into his ken and out of it again. It is the life-and-death decision of Britain itself, as a free, independent and self-governing nation. For weeks, for months the battle on the floor of the House of Commons will swing backwards and forwards, through interminable hours of debates and procedures and votes in the division lobbies; and sure enough the enemies and despisers of the House of Commons will represent it all as some esoteric game or charade which means nothing for the outside world. Do not be deceived. With other weapons and in other ways the contention is as surely about the future of Britain's nationhood as were the combats which raged in the skies over southern England in the autumn of 1940. The gladiators are few; their weapons are but words; and yet the fight is everyman's.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

Speech at Newton, Montgomeryshire (4 March 1972), from The Common Market: Renegotiate or Come Out (Elliot Right Way Books, 1973), pp. 57-8
1970s

Shah Jahan photo
Charles Krauthammer photo
John Milton photo

“Swinges the scaly horror of his folded tail.”

Hymn, stanza 18, line 172
On the Morning of Christ's Nativity (1629)

David Baboulene photo
Timothy Levitch photo
Robert T. Bakker photo
TotalBiscuit photo

“This monkey is running backwards and forwards! This tribesman right here—" [starts swinging his machete in an attempt to get the tribesman's attention] "Hi.”

TotalBiscuit (1984–2018) British game commentator

WTF Is…? series, Day One: Garry's Incident (October 1, 2013)

Jack Buck photo

“Gibson … swings and a fly ball to deep right field. This is gonna be a home run! UNBELIEVABLE! A home run for Gibson! And the Dodgers have won the game, five to four; I don't believe what I just saw! I don't BELIEVE what I just saw!”

Jack Buck (1924–2002) American sportscaster

Calling an injured Kirk Gibson's walk-off home run in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series off Dennis Eckersley.
1980s
Source: Jack Buck's call of Kirk Gibson's home run in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series on CBS Radio (via WJBC-AM in Bloomington, Illinois) http://www.wjbc.com/media/buck4.MP3

Babe Ruth photo
John Fante photo
Doug Stanhope photo

“We live in a world where people will have a GPS and a crucifix on the same dashboard — and you want me to have hope for these fuckin' monkeys on swing-sets?”

Doug Stanhope (1967) American stand-up comedian, actor, and author

Oslo: Burning The Bridge To Nowhere (2011)

Geert Wilders photo
Blackie Lawless photo
Tom Petty photo

“Yeah, the world would swing if I were king.
Can I help it if I still dream time to time?”

Tom Petty (1950–2017) American musician

It's Good To Be King
Lyrics, Wildflowers (1994)

Roberto Clemente photo
George Bird Evans photo
Nick Hornby photo
Rene Balcer photo

“Women write crime better than men do. Men tend to play it safe, relying on an old-boy's network (to get work). Women feel freer. They swing for the bleachers.”

Rene Balcer (1954) screenwriter, producer and director

Quoted in The New York Times , December 30, 2008, Onstage, Tackling Ambition and Crime: On Writers.

Valerie Jarrett photo

“Michelle was so mature beyond her years, so thoughtful and perceptive. She really prodded me about what the job would be like because she had lots of choices. I offered it to her on the spot, which was totally inappropriate because I should have talked to the mayor first. But I just knew she was really special.
Barack never grills. That's part of what is so effective about him: He puts you completely at ease, and the next thing you know he's asking more and more probing questions and gets you to open up and reflect a little bit. That night we talked about his childhood compared to my childhood and realized we both had rather…unusual childhoods.
Married in 1983, separated in 1987, and divorced in 1988. Enough said. He was a physician. He passed away. I want to say in about 1991.
We grew up together. We were friends since childhood. In a sense, he was the boy next door. I married without really appreciating how hard divorce would be.
I have to tell you: My daughter is in seventh heaven about me being in Vogue. Nothing else I have done has fazed her at all. But this! She's like, 'Oh, Mom. You don't understand. This is really big.'
I have never heard him yell, Ever. Not once in seventeen years. He's not a yeller.
Because my dad worked at the university, he could swing by and take Laura to school and pick her up from her first day of nursery school until the day she graduated from high school. They would often have breakfast and have these wonderful conversations.”

Valerie Jarrett (1956) Chicago lawyer, businesswoman, civic leader; senior advisor to U.S. Senator Barack Obama

September 2008 interview with Vogue https://web.archive.org/web/20080930190831/http://www.style.com/vogue/feature/2008_Oct_Valerie_Jarrett//

Michael Johns photo
Willem de Sitter photo
W.E.B. Du Bois photo
Mordecai Richler photo
Howie Rose photo
Thérèse of Lisieux photo
John Dankworth photo

“My father would take me to the playground, and put me on mood swings.”

Jay London (1966) American comedian

One-liners

Clement Attlee photo

“We are told that we have to accept the Treaty of Rome. I have read the Treaty of Rome pretty carefully, and it expresses an outlook entirely different from our own. It may be that I am insular, but I value our Parliamentary outlook, an outlook which has extended throughout the Commonwealth. That is not the same position that holds on the Continent of Europe. No one of these principal countries in the Common Market has been very successful in running Parliamentary institutions: Germany, hardly any experience; Italy, very little; France, a swing between a dictatorship and more or less anarchic Parliament, and not very successfully. As I read the Treaty of Rome, the whole position means that we shall enter a federation which is composed in an entirely different way. I do not say it is the wrong way. But it is not our way. In this set-up it is the official who really puts up all the proposals; the whole of the planning is done by officials. It seems to me that the Ministers come in at a later stage—and if there is anything like a Federal Parliament, at a later stage still. I do not think that that is the way this country has developed, or wishes to develop. I am all for working in with our Continental friends. I was one of those who worked to build up NATO; I have worked for European integration. But that is a very different thing from bringing us into a close association which, I may say, is not one for defence, or even just for foreign policy. The fact is that if the designs behind the Common Market are carried out, we are bound to be affected in every phase of our national life. There would be no national planning, except under the guidance of Continental planning—we shall not be able to deal with our own problems; we shall not be able to build up the country in the way we want to do, so far as I can see. I think we shall be subject to overall control and planning by others. That is my objection.”

Clement Attlee (1883–1967) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/lords/1962/nov/08/britain-and-the-common-market in the House of Lords on the British application to join the Common Market (8 November 1962).
1960s

Harry Turtledove photo

“A fellow with a great voice shouted, "Hearken now to the words of the President of the Confederate States of America, the honorable Woodrow Wilson." The president turned this way and that, surveying the great swarm of people all around him in the moment of silence the volley had brought. Then, swinging back to face the statue of George Washington- and, incidentally, Reginald Bartlett- he said, "The father of our country warned us against entangling alliances, a warning that served us well when we were yoked to the North, before its arrogance created in our Confederacy what had never existed before- a national consciousness. That was our salvation and our birth as a free and independent country." Silence broke then, with a thunderous outpouring of applause. Wilson raised a bony right hand. Slowly, silence, of a semblance of it, returned. The president went on, "But our birth of national consciousness made the United States jealous, and they tried to beat us down. We found loyal friends in England and France. Can we now stand aside when the German tyrant threatens to grind them under his iron heel?" "No!" Bartlett shouted himself hoarse, along with thousands of his countrymen. Stunned, deafened, he had trouble hearing what Wilson said next: "Jealous still, the United States in their turn also developed a national consciousness, a dark and bitter one, as any so opposed to ours must be." He spoke not like a politician inflaming a crowd but like a professor setting out arguments- he had taken one path before choosing the other. "The German spirit of arrogance and militarism has taken hold in the United States; they see only the gun as the proper arbiter between nations, and their president takes Wilhelm as his model. He struts and swaggers and acts the fool in all regards."”

Now he sounded like a politician; he despised Theodore Roosevelt, and took pleasure in Roosevelt's dislike for him.
Source: The Great War: American Front (1998), p. 32

Ani DiFranco photo

“My country tis of thee,
To take swings at each other on talk-show TV.”

Ani DiFranco (1970) musician and activist

Tis of Thee
Song lyrics

Gerald James Whitrow photo

“We now face five years of an unbridled Conservative government that is intent on swingeing cuts, further attacks on society’s most vulnerable and on our NHS. This will severely limit what can be achieved but I am determined to work tirelessly to do what I can to make sure local people are heard in Parliament and protected from the worst of what is to come.”

Jo Cox (1974–2016) UK politician

Column: Jo Cox – After a hard day’s night, the real work starts http://www.batleynews.co.uk/news/local/column-jo-cox-after-a-hard-day-s-night-the-real-work-starts-1-7264438 (16 May 2015)

Madison Cawein photo

“A rope; a prayer; and an oak-tree near,
And a score of hands to swing him clear.
A grim, black thing for the setting sun
And the moon and the stars to gaze upon.”

Madison Cawein (1865–1914) poet from Louisville, Kentucky

The Man Hunt.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1919)

Donald Tsang photo

“People can go to the extreme like what we saw during the Cultural Revolution. For instance, in China, when people take everything into their own hands, then you cannot govern the place. … [It] was the people taking power into their own hands. Now that is what you mean by democracy if you take it to the full swing.”

Donald Tsang (1944) Hong Kong politician

As quoted in "HK's Tsang apologises for gaffe" at BBC News (13 October 2007) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7042941.stm
Variant transcription or translation:
If you go to the extreme you have the cultural revolution for instance in China. Then people take everything into their hands, then you cannot govern the place. … It was people taking power into their own hands. This is what we mean by democracy.
As quoted in "Hong Kong leader apologises for democracy gaffe" at AFP (14 October 2007) http://web.archive.org/web/20070609092458/http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5h_ytPeUlA7mXw3eMQ6WHSo_emsLw

Ryszard Kapuściński photo
Yogi Berra photo

“Lopat was the cutest of the gang, the easiest to catch because he had almost perfect control of every pitch at different speeds. He made batters impatient. They couldn't wait for what looked so easy to hit and they'd swing at his motion.”

Yogi Berra (1925–2015) American baseball player, manager, coach

As quoted in "Raschi Was Best Hurler: Yogi" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=2rEfAAAAIBAJ&sjid=PdcEAAAAIBAJ&pg=1965%2C6170607.

Fiona Apple photo
Mark Knopfler photo
Willem de Sitter photo

“Both the law of inertia and the law of gravitation contain a numerical factor or a constant belonging to matter, which is called mass. We have thus two definitions of mass; one by the law of inertia: mass is the ratio between force and acceleration. We may call the mass thus defined the inertial or passive mass, as it is a measure of the resistance offered by matter to a force acting on it. The second is defined by the law of gravitation, and might be called the gravitational or active mass, being a measure of the force exerted by one material body on another. The fact that these two constants or coefficients are the same is, in Newton's system, to be considered as a most remarkable accidental coincidence and was decidedly felt as such by Newton himself. He made experiments to determine the equality of the two masses by swinging a pendulum, of which the bob was hollow and could be filled up with different materials. The force acting on the pendulum is proportional to its active mass, its inertia is proportional to its passive mass, so that the period will depend on the ratio of the passive and the active mass. Consequently the fact that the period of all these different pendulums was the same, proves that this ratio is a constant, and can be made equal to unity by a suitable choice of units, i. e., the inertial and the gravitational mass are the same. These experiments have been repeated in the nineteenth century by Bessel, and in our own times by Eötvös and Zeeman, and the identity of the inertial and the gravitational mass is one of the best ascertained empirical facts in physics-perhaps the best. It follows that the so-called fictitious forces introduced by a motion of the body of reference, such as a rotation, are indistinguishable from real forces…. In Einstein's general theory of relativity there is also no formal theoretical difference, as there was in Newton's system…. the equality of inertial and gravitational mass is no longer an accidental coincidence, but a necessity.”

Willem de Sitter (1872–1934) Dutch cosmologist

p, 125
"The Astronomical Aspect of the Theory of Relativity" (1933)

Frederick Goddard Tuckerman photo
Charlie Brooker photo

“A lot of people think right-wingers aren't capable of being amusing at all. Not true. Mussolini looked hilarious swinging from that lamppost.”

Charlie Brooker (1971) journalist, broadcaster and writer from England

Screen Burn, The Guardian, 24 February 2007, 2007-08-19 http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguide/columnists/story/0,,2019169,00.html,
Guardian columns, Screen Burn

Elbert Hubbard photo

“The newspapers print what the people want, and thus does the savage still swing his club and flourish his spear.”

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher fue el escritor del jarron azul

Source: The Note Book of Elbert Hubbard (1927), p. 142.

Jeffrey Tucker photo
Ray Comfort photo

“Evolution swings open a door to do whatever the evolutionist pleases, as long as what he does is within the bounds of a civil law he is ever expanding to accommodate his sinful desires.”

Ray Comfort (1949) New Zealand-born Christian minister and evangelist

You Can Lead an Atheist to Evidence, But You Can't Make Him Think (2009)

Theodore Kaczynski photo
Richard Rorty photo
James Brown photo

“Come here sister… Papa's in the swing.
He ain't too hip… about that new breed babe.
He ain't no drag,
Papa's got a brand new bag.”

James Brown (1933–2006) American singer, songwriter, musician, and recording artist

Papa's Got a Brand New Bag' (1965)
Song lyrics

Roberto Clemente photo

“With two men on base I was more concerned with driving in a run than getting No. 2,000. I set a goal of 100 RBIs and 25 home runs at the start of the season. Usually I'm not a home run hitter but I've been swinging more for home runs this season then ever before.”

Roberto Clemente (1934–1972) Puerto Rican baseball player

Speaking with reporters after simultaneously reaching several milestones with one swing of the batː 2,000 career hits, 23 home runs (matching his previous high in 1961), and, for the first time in his career, 100 RBIs or more for a season; as quoted in "Clemente's 2,000th Puts Bucs On Top" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=kbIiAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ZbMFAAAAIBAJ&dq=men-base-concerned-driving-run-getting-no&pg=755%2C515794 by Jeff Meyers (UPI), in The Beaver County Times (Saturday, September 3, 1966), p. C-1
Baseball-related, <big><big>1960s</big></big>, <big>1966</big>

Sarada Devi photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Arnold Schwarzenegger photo
Camille Paglia photo
Ken Livingstone photo

“I just long for the day I wake up and find that the Saudi royal family are swinging from lampposts and that they've got a proper government that represents the people of Saudi Arabia.”

Ken Livingstone (1945) Mayor of London between 2000 and 2008

As quoted in "New Labour, new Ken? Think again as Mayor speaks" by Joe Murphy in Evening Standard (8 April 2004), p. 19.
Interview with The Guardian (7 April 2004)

Conor McGregor photo

“I just want to swing a few lefts and a few rights for a couple of hundred mill in peace.”

Conor McGregor (1988) Irish mixed martial artist and boxer

Twitter post https://twitter.com/TheNotoriousMMA/status/659853813403295746 (29 October 2015)
2010s, 2015

Robert E. Howard photo
Joni Mitchell photo

“They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
and a swinging hot spot.”

Joni Mitchell (1943) Canadian musician

"Big Yellow Taxi"
Songs

Theodore L. Cuyler photo
John Milton photo

“Oft, on a plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off curfew sound
Over some wide-watered shore,
Swinging low with sullen roar.”

John Milton (1608–1674) English epic poet

Source: Il Penseroso (1631), Line 73

Katherine Heigl photo
Marsden Hartley photo

“The essential of a real picture is that the things which occur in it occur to him in his peculiarly personal fashion.... the idea of modernity is but a new attachment of things universal – a fresh relationship to the courses of the sun and to the living swing of the earth – a new fire of affection for the living essence present everywhere.”

Marsden Hartley (1877–1943) American artist

statement for catalogue of 1914 exhibition at 291, reprinted in On art, p. 62; as quoted in Marsden Hartley, by Gail R. Scott, Abbeville Publishers, Cross River Press, 1988, New York p. 49
1908 - 1920

Roberto Clemente photo

“Look, here is the way I swing. I swing hard. I don’t punch the ball. I have bat control, and I don’t go for home runs, but I still swing as hard as some fellows who swing for the fences. My back is practically to first base when I finish the swing. I have to turn around before I can start running. Sometimes the ball is in the fielder’s hands before I drop the bat.”

Roberto Clemente (1934–1972) Puerto Rican baseball player

On how being right-handed negatively impacted his chances of batting .400, as quoted in "Aches, Pains... and Base Hits" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=W6lWAAAAIBAJ&sjid=xecDAAAAIBAJ&pg=7036%2C4509721 by Jim Murray, in The Los Angeles Times (August 10, 1971). Also see the above comment (August 11, 1964) re "stepping in the bucket."
Baseball-related, <big><big>1970s</big></big>, <big>1971</big>

Barry Boehm photo