Ogden Nash citáty
Ogden Nash
Datum narození: 19. srpen 1902
Datum úmrtí: 19. květen 1971
Frederic Ogden Nash byl americký básník a humorista.
Studium na Harvardově univerzitě nedokončil, pracoval jako učitel, reklamní copywriter a redaktor nakladatelství Doubleday. Publikoval v týdeníku The New Yorker a v roce 1931 mu vyšla první kniha. Byl autorem nonsensové poezie, limeriků, epigramů a písňových textů k muzikálům, jeho záběr zahrnoval hříčky určené dětem, politickou satiru i jazykové experimenty. Vystupoval v rozhlasových pořadech a na veřejných čteních, vydal devatenáct knih a okolo 1500 básní.Do češtiny ho překládá Jiří Weinberger .
Jeho příbuzným byl generál Francis Nash, podle něhož se jmenuje město Nashville.
Citáty Ogden Nash
„Children aren't happy with nothing to ignore,
And that's what parents were created for.“
"The Parent"; paraphrased variants:
Children aren't happy without something to ignore, and that's what parents were created for.
Parents were invented to make children happy by giving them something to ignore.
Happy Days (1933)
„A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of.“
"A Dog's Best Friend Is His Illiteracy" in The Private Dining Room (1953)
Paraphrased variant: A door is that which a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of.
Zdroj: Private Dining-room and Other New Verses
„Listen, buds, it's March twenty first;
Don't you know enough to burst?“
Spring Song http://books.google.com/books?id=bkFLAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Listen+buds+it's+March+twenty+first+don't+you+know+enough+to+burst%22&pg=PA138#v=onepage
I'm a Stranger Here Myself (1938)
Kontext: Listen, buds, it's March twenty first;
Don't you know enough to burst?
Come on, birds, unlock your throats!
Come on, gardeners, shed your coats!
„And the prospects for my future social life couldn't possibly be barrener.
Did I tell you that the prospects for my future social life couldn't be barrener?“
Good Intentions (1942), So Does Everybody Else, Only Not So Much
Kontext: And what really turns my corpuscles to ice,
I carry around clippings and read them to people twice.
And I know what I am doing while I am doing it and I don't want to do it but I can't help doing it and I am just another Ancient Mariner,
And the prospects for my future social life couldn't possibly be barrener.
Did I tell you that the prospects for my future social life couldn't be barrener?
„My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky;
Contrariwise, my blood runs cold
When little boys go by.“
Many Long Years Ago (1945), Song To Be Sung by the Father of Infant Female Children
Kontext: My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky;
Contrariwise, my blood runs cold
When little boys go by.
For little boys as little boys,
No special hate I carry,
But now and then they grow to men,
And when they do, they marry.
No matter how they tarry,
Eventually they marry.
And, swine among the pearls,
They marry little girls.
„How are we to survive? Solemnity is not the answer, any more than witless and irresponsible frivolity is. I think our best chance lies in humor, which in this case means a wry acceptance of our predicament. We don't have to like it but we can at least recognize its ridiculous aspects, one of which is ourselves.“
Commencement address at his daughter Linell's boarding school, as quoted http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/05/AR2005050501359_pf.html in The Washington Post (8 May 2005)
Kontext: Among other things I think humor is a shield, a weapon, a survival kit... So here we are several billion of us, crowded into our global concentration camp for the duration. How are we to survive? Solemnity is not the answer, any more than witless and irresponsible frivolity is. I think our best chance lies in humor, which in this case means a wry acceptance of our predicament. We don't have to like it but we can at least recognize its ridiculous aspects, one of which is ourselves.
„I dont' mind their having a lot of money, and I don't care how they employ it,
But I do think that they damn well ought to admit they enjoy it.“
"The Terrible People"
Many Long Years Ago (1945)
Kontext: People who have what they want are very fond of telling people who haven't what they want that they really don't want it,
And I wish I could afford to gather all such people into a gloomy castle on the Danube and hire half a dozen capable Draculas to haunt it.
I dont' mind their having a lot of money, and I don't care how they employ it,
But I do think that they damn well ought to admit they enjoy it.
„Just when you think that at least the outlook is so black that it can grow no blacker, it worsens“
"Everybody Tells Me Everything" in The Face Is Familiar (1940)
Kontext: Just when you think that at least the outlook is so black that it can grow no blacker, it worsens,
And that is why I do not like the news, because there has never been an era when so many things were going so right for so many of the wrong persons.
„How pleasant to sit on the beach,
On the beach, on the sand, in the sun,
With ocean galore within reach,
And nothing at all to be done!.“
Many Long Years Ago (1945), Pretty Halcyon Days
„Some primal termite knocked on wood
And tasted it, and found it good!“
"The Termite"
Good Intentions (1942)
Kontext: Some primal termite knocked on wood
And tasted it, and found it good!
And that is why your Cousin May
Fell through the parlor floor today.
„And particularly because they all observe one rule which woe betides the banker who fails to heed it,
Which is you must never lend any money to anybody unless they don't need it.“
"Bankers Are Just Like Anybody Else, Except Richer"
I'm a Stranger Here Myself (1938)
Kontext: Most bankers dwell in marble halls,
Which they get to dwell in because they encourage deposits and discourage withdrawals,
And particularly because they all observe one rule which woe betides the banker who fails to heed it,
Which is you must never lend any money to anybody unless they don't need it.
„I'll pepper his powder, and salt his bottle,
And give him readings from Aristotle.
Sand for his spinach I'll gladly bring,
And Tabasco sauce for his teething ring.
Then perhaps he'll struggle through fire and water
To marry somebody else's daughter.“
Many Long Years Ago (1945), Song To Be Sung by the Father of Infant Female Children
Kontext: A fig for embryo Lohengrins!
I'll open all his safety pins,
I'll pepper his powder, and salt his bottle,
And give him readings from Aristotle.
Sand for his spinach I'll gladly bring,
And Tabasco sauce for his teething ring.
Then perhaps he'll struggle through fire and water
To marry somebody else's daughter.
„Perhaps indeed the possession of wealth is constantly distressing,
But I should be quite willing to assume every curse of wealth if I could at the same time assume every blessing.“
"The Terrible People"
Many Long Years Ago (1945)
Kontext: Perhaps indeed the possession of wealth is constantly distressing,
But I should be quite willing to assume every curse of wealth if I could at the same time assume every blessing.
The only incurable troubles of the rich are the troubles that money can't cure,
Which is a kind of trouble that is even more troublesome if you are poor.
Certainly there are lots of things in life that money won't buy, but it's very funny —
Have you ever tried to buy them without money?
„A young person is a person with nothing to learn
One who already knows that ice does not chill and fire does not burn…“
"Fortunately"
Versus (1949)
Kontext: A young person is a person with nothing to learn
One who already knows that ice does not chill and fire does not burn...
It knows it can spend six hours in the sun on its first
day at the beach without ending up a skinless beet,
And it knows it can walk barefoot through the barn
without running a nail in its feet....
Meanwhile psychologists grow rich
Writing that the young are ones' should not
undermine the self-confidence of which.
„Among other things I think humor is a shield, a weapon, a survival kit…“
Commencement address at his daughter Linell's boarding school, as quoted http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/05/AR2005050501359_pf.html in The Washington Post (8 May 2005)
Kontext: Among other things I think humor is a shield, a weapon, a survival kit... So here we are several billion of us, crowded into our global concentration camp for the duration. How are we to survive? Solemnity is not the answer, any more than witless and irresponsible frivolity is. I think our best chance lies in humor, which in this case means a wry acceptance of our predicament. We don't have to like it but we can at least recognize its ridiculous aspects, one of which is ourselves.
„Abracadabra, thus we learn,
The more you create, the less you earn.“
"One From One Leaves Two" http://holyjoe.net/poetry/nash9.htm
Kontext: Abracadabra, thus we learn,
The more you create, the less you earn.
The less you earn, the more you're given,
The less you lead, the more you're driven,
The more destroyed, the more they feed,
The more you pay, the more they need
The more you earn, the less you keep,
And now I lay me down to sleep.
I pray the Lord my soul should take
If the tax collector hasn't got it before I wake.
