Rerun of a bad movie; Nail jelly to the wall

[Dave Wilton]

This thread, plus the one about the Vince Lombardi quote and a discussion on
my website about a 19th century economics quote, got me thinking...

Is there a source that addresses misattributed or fallacious quotes in
something resembling a comprehensive manner? There are an enormous number of
false quotations floating about out there. A single volume (or website) that
debunks the worst of these would be a very useful tool. I know that many
books of quotations and sites like snopes.com do this on a case-by-case
basis, but I've never seen a source that attempts a comprehensive treatment.

I'm not suggesting that Fred's book do this. I'm just wondering if anyone
has done it.


> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society
> [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf
> Of Fred Shapiro
> Sent: Wednesday, January 22, 2003 10:12 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Rerun of a bad movie; Nail jelly to the wall
>
>
> yOn Wed, 22 Jan 2003 Bapopik at AOL.COM wrote:
>
> >    Two presidential phrases.  What does Fred Shapiro have?
>
> This question is a good excuse for me to clarify a point.  Barry's
> postings sometimes seem to envision that the Yale Dictionary
> of Quotations
> is going to cover every phrase or expression ever uttered; this
> expectation parallels his apparent expectation that the OED
> should cover
> every term ever uttered in English or any other language.  In fact, my
> book will be limited to more significant quotations, just as every
> real-world reference book has to be limited in various ways.  It would
> never occur to me that "rerun of a bad movie" or "nail jelly
> to the wall"
> would be significant enough for me to cover.
>
> In a way I hate to articulate the above, because Barry posts
> such great
> stuff in furtherance of his unlimited vision of inclusiveness and I
> don't want to discourage him, but I don't want unrealistic
> expectations to
> grow up with regard to my book.
>
> Please keep up the great work, Barry!
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------
> Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
> Associate Librarian for Collections and     YALE DICTIONARY
> OF QUOTATIONS
>   Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press,
> Yale Law School                             forthcoming
> e-mail: fred.shapiro at yale.edu
http://quotationdictionary.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------