[Ads-l] Why George Bernard Shaw opposed cut flowers in vases

ADSGarson O'Toole adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM
Tue Oct 4 22:21:42 UTC 2022


Correspondent Stu Silverstein sent me a valuable new citation
revealing that Shaw received credit for the joke in 1899 within the
London journal “The Garden”.

[ref] 1899 May 20, The Garden: Illustrated Weekly Journal of
Horticulture in All Its Branches, Volume 55, Number 1435, The New
Style, Quote Page 358, Column 1, London, England. (Google Books Full
View) link [/ref]

https://books.google.com/books?id=XpcAAAAAYAAJ&q=%22or+a+vase%22#v=snippet&

[Begin excerpt]
Mr. G. Bernard Shaw on flowers is—well, he is Mr. G. Bernard Shaw,
just as he is on the drama and things generally. As thus: “A
well-balanced mind has no favourites. People who have a favourite
flower generally cut off its head and stick it into a button-hole or a
vase. I wonder they do not do the same to their favourite children. It
is a crime to pluck a flower. I dislike formal gardens. At any given
moment two thirds of its blossoms are dead.
[End excerpt]

Dan helpfully mentioned to me off-list that “The World and His Wife”
was a monthly magazine. WorldCat indicates that this magazine was
published in London between 1904 and 1910. Hence, this magazine may
have been the source of the piece published in the “Boston Evening
Transcript” in 1906.

Updates to the QI article should be visible within 48 hours.
https://quoteinvestigator.com/2022/10/03/cut-flowers/

Garson

On Mon, Oct 3, 2022 at 7:57 PM ADSGarson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks for your helpful response, Dan.
>
> Pascal Tréguer of Word Histories has an article about “(all) the world
> and his wife”. His first citation is dated 1730.
> https://wordhistories.net/2020/04/22/world-and-his-wife/
>
> The Oxford English Dictionary has an entry with the same citation.
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> wife n.
> P4. colloquial. With singular and plural agreement. (all) the world
> and his wife: a large and miscellaneous group of people; everybody.
> Cf. world n. Phrases 6b(a).
> 1730   Daily Post 30 June (advt.)    A Defence of Hen-pecks: Or, All
> the World and his Wife.
> [End excerpt]
>
> Garson

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