[Ads-l] Quote: The face of Venus, the figure of Juno, the brains of Minerva, the memory of Macaulay=?utf-8?Q?=E2=80=A6_?=the hide of a rhinoceros

[MULLINS, WILLIAM D (Bill) CIV USARMY RDECOM AMRDEC (US)]

_New York Clipper_ 12/24/1919, p. 55 col 1.

"A  great English player, asked what was most necessary in order to become an actress, answered that it was "to possess the  face and figure of a Greek goddess, the voice of an angel, the temper of a dove, the disposition of a saint, the energy of a dynamo, the digestion of an ostrich, the strength of an elephant and the hide of a rhinoceros!"

> 
> ----
> 
> The items listed in the subject line are the requirements for a successful theater actress. The Concise Columbia Dictionary of Quotations
> (1989), The Filmgoer's Book of Quotes (1974), The New York Public Library Book of Twentieth-Century American Quotations (1992) and
> other references attribute the remark to Ethel Barrymore. But Nigel Rees's reference The Best Guide to Humorous Quotations (2011) cites a
> 1933 autobiography by Dame Madge Kendal.
> 
> The Quote Investigator website now has an entry that agrees with Rees.
> https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/08/29/rhino/
> 
> In 1933 Kendal published her autobiography "Dame Madge Kendal, By Herself". I have not yet seen the autobiography directly, but the key
> passage was reprinted in a review in "The Leeds Mercury" in England:
> 
> [ref] 1933 October 31, The Leeds Mercury, Dame Madge Kendal: How She Chose Her Epitaph, Quote Page 6, Column 4, County: West
> Yorkshire, England. (British Newspaper Archive)[/ref]
> 
> [Begin excerpt]
> She sums up the qualifications of a young woman for a successful career on the stage as "The face of Venus, the figure of Juno, the brains
> of Minerva, the memory of Macaulay, the chastity of Diana, the grace of Terpsichore, but, above and beyond all, the hide of a rhinoceros."
> [End excerpt]
> 
> The QI entry lists various precursors.
> Feedback welcome, Garson
> 
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> The American Dialect Society - Caution-http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org