Socrates misattribution – bad manners of children – proposed origin 1907

[Jonathan Lighter]

Nice work, Garson. We need more of this sort of thing.

As Firesign Theater used to say, "Everything you know is wrong."

I repeatedly find this to be so.

JL

On Mon, Oct 19, 2009 at 11:36 PM, Garson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Greetings list members. This is my first post. There is a fascinating
> quote about misbehaving children in antiquity that is usually ascribed
> to Plato or Socrates. I think I may have found its origin in 1907.
> Here is an example of a modern variant of the quote from 2008:
>
> "The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for
> authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place
> of exercise." This quote is attributed to Plato in the article
> "Generation Me vs. You Revisited" on January 17, 2008 in the New York
> Times. A correction dated January 24 is appended that states "Its
> origin is unclear, although many researchers agree that Plato is not
> the source."
>
> YBQ has a 1948 version from the New York Times on page 717 under
> Socrates and correctly notes that it is misattributed.
>
> I believe that the quote was first crafted by Kenneth John Freeman in
> his dissertation for Cambridge published in 1907. Here is the original
> wording that was modified by later quotemeisters: "The counts of the
> indictment are luxury, bad manners, contempt for authority, disrespect
> to elders, and a love for chatter in place of exercise." Freeman was
> not quoting anyone; instead, he was presenting his own summary of the
> complaints directed against young people in ancient times.
>
> Citation: "Schools of Hellas: an Essay on the Practice and Theory of
> Ancient Greek Education from 600 to 300 BC" by Kenneth John Freeman,
> Macmillan and Co., London, page 74, 1908 (First impression 1907). The
> scan of this book from Harvard library is downloadable at Google
> Books. Internet Archive has it also.
>
> There is a longer version of the quote above that has appeared in
> newspapers and books. It was derived by using another nearby passage
> from Freeman's book. Here is the original text: "Children began to be
> the tyrants, not the slaves, of their households. They no longer rose
> from their seats when an elder entered the room; they contradicted
> their parents, chattered before company, gobbled up the dainties at
> table, and committed various offences against Hellenic tastes, such as
> crossing their legs. They tyrannised over the paidagogoi and
> schoolmasters."
>
> Garson O'Toole
>
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