[Ads-l] A good walk spoiled

ADSGarson O'Toole adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM
Tue Jul 26 23:24:07 UTC 2022


Inspired by Pete Morris’s discovery I took another look in the British
Newspaper Archive and found a slightly earlier citation in an Irish
newspaper within an article written by an unnamed “northern Gael”.

Date: April 20, 1901
Newspaper: Enniscorthy Guardian
Newspaper Location: Wexford County, Republic of Ireland
Article: Sporting - Gaelic (From a northern Gael)
Quote Page 4, Column 6
Database: British Newspaper Archive

[Begin excerpt]
I am not a lover of the snobbish game of cricket, neither would I care
to see our Irish boys disporting themselves at the aristocratic game
of lawn tennis, not to mention golf, which is a good walk spoiled.
[End excerpt]

Now the QI article has been updated Pete Morris has been acknowledged.
The changes should be visible within 48 hours.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/28/golf-good-walk/

Garson

On Sun, Jul 24, 2022 at 3:49 PM ADSGarson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  Dan Goncharoff wrote:
> > Didn't Quote Investigator cover the same territory starting a decade or so
> > ago?
>
> Thanks for your comments Dan and Fred. There were messages in 2010 and
> 2012 from me about the golf quotation.
>
> https://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2010-January/096157.html
> https://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2012-June/119799.html
>
> While listening to the podcast I felt that Fred was making a good
> point about the frequency of Mark Twain misattributions. Also, I
> recalled there was no substantive evidence that Twain employed the
> golf quotation.
>
> The precise date of the earliest citation did not occur to me. The QI
> article was last updated more than a decade ago. That is my excuse.
>
> Happily, Pete Morris was inspired to find and share an excellent 1901
> citation (and others). So there has been an overall benefit.
>
> Garson

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