Alexander Woollcott Quotes

American critic (1887-1943)

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Alexander Woollcott (January 19, 1887 – January 23, 1943) was an American critic and journalist known for his involvement in the Algonquin Round Table and his writings in The New Yorker magazine.

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Birth Name: Alexander Humphreys Woollcott

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All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening.

Well, if I were thus rationed in this article and could have but one adjective for George Gershwin, that adjective would be "ingenuous." Ingenuous at and about his piano. Once an occasional composer named Oscar Levant stood beside that piano while those sure, sinewy, catlike Gershwin fingers beat their brilliant drum-fire—the tumultuous cascade of the "Rhapsody In Blue," the amorous languor of "The Man I Love," the impish glee of "Fascinating Rhythm," the fine, jaunty, dust-spurning scorn of "Strike Up the Band." If the performer was familiar with the work of any other composer, he gave no evidence of it. Levant (who, by the way, makes a fleeting appearance in the new Dashlell Hammett book, under the guise of Levi Oscant) could be heard mutterIng under his breath, "An evening with Gershwin Is a Gershwln evening."
"I wonder," said our young composer dreamily, "if my music will be played a hundred years from now."
"It certainly will be," said the bitter Levant,"if you are still around."

Once in pre-war days, when curiously-bonneted women drivers were familiar sights at the taxi-wheels, I cried out to one in my dismay: "Is there no speed limit in this mad city?"
"Oh, yes, monsieur," she answered sweetly over her shoulder, "but no one has ever succeeded in reaching it."

The two oldest professions in the world — ruined by amateurs.

All the things I really like to do are either immoral, illegal or fattening

I've never had the impertinence to be sorry for Helen Keller. I'd as soon be sorry for Niagara Falls. But now as I bring the story up to date, I'm shriveled with shame when I recall that at times in my life — my easy life — I've actually been sorry for myself. You too? We've got our nerve, haven't we?

I have no need of your God-damned sympathy. I only wish to be entertained by some of your grosser reminiscences.

At 83 Shaw's mind was perhaps not quite as good as it used to be, but it was still better than anyone else's.

Alexander Woollcott: What could be rarer than a Woollcott First Edition?
Franklin Pierce Adams: A Woollcott second edition.

[You look like] a dishonest Abe Lincoln.