Modern Fable: Lions and gazelles (Dan Montano 1985 July 6)

[George Thompson]

I have a very vague memory of this line being used in a late 1940s-early
1950s comic movie.  Out of the fog, I have a vision of Donald O'Connor.  It
was in the context of the freshman class being welcomed to college.

GAT

On Sun, Nov 20, 2011 at 7:13 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:

> >"Look to the left of you.  Look to the right of you.  One of the three of
> you will be gone before the year is out."
>
> I don't have a source at hand, but phrases to this effect were also
> (allegedly) in use during WWII in a more dire and immediate context.
>
> JL
>
> On Sun, Nov 20, 2011 at 7:05 PM, Baker, John <JBAKER at stradley.com> wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Baker, John" <JBAKER at STRADLEY.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: Modern Fable: Lions and gazelles (Dan Montano 1985
> July 6)
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> >        In the old days at Harvard Law School, incoming students were told
> >
> >        In recent decades, few students flunk out, so some other way had
> to be found to intimidate the newcomers.  Dean James Vorenberg was
> notorious for telling them the story about the bear on the first day.  I
> remember hearing it in 1981, which may have been the first time he told it
> (ISTR that the student newspaper the next year had a story about it and the
> fact that he had told it for two years straight).  I had heard the story
> before when I first heard it from Vorenberg in convocation.
> >
> >        As given on page 82 of Quote It Completely,
> http://books.google.com/books?id=kjwVASsTUm0C, the story goes as follows:
> >
> >        <<Two hikers looked out of their tent one morning and saw a
> large, hungry, and athletic-looking bear waiting for them.  After some
> discussion they decided they might as well make a run for it.  One of them
> sat down and started putting on his running shoes.  The other said, "Don't
> you know there's no way you can outrun that bear?"  To this the first
> replied, "I don't have to outrun the bear--I only have to outrun you.">>
> >
> >
> > John Baker
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> Behalf Of Jonathan Lighter
> > Sent: Sunday, November 20, 2011 6:23 PM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject: Re: Modern Fable: Lions and gazelles (Dan Montano 1985 July 6)
> >
> > Me too. But probably only within the past year or so.
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Sun, Nov 20, 2011 at 5:51 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> >> Subject:      Re: Modern Fable: Lions and gazelles (Dan Montano 1985
> July 6)
> >>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> On Nov 20, 2011, at 2:39 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >>
> >>> Even more proverbial than before.
> >>>
> >>> On NPR, the top Jeopardy winner of all time explains that, in order to
> >>> win, "You don't have to outrun the bear. You just have to outrun the
> >>> other guy."
> >>>
> >>> JL
> >>>
> >> I've encountered this not as a proverb but as a punchline of a joke:
>  "I don't have to run faster than the bear--I just have to run faster than
> you."
> >>
> >> LH
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
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> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --
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> truth."
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>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
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>



--
George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much since then.

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