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Malevolence
On Randolph Churchill, after a recent operation:
'A triumph of modern science to find the only part of Randolph that wasn't malignant and remove it.' — Evelyn Waugh
He's all right in his own way, except that he always wants it.
Frederick Delius sat in on a rehearsal of one of his works to hear how the conductor, Sir Thomas Beecham, was getting on with it. During one of the breaks Beecham asked the composer how the previous section had been. Delius told him that it had been all right:
'Except for the horns hi the last bit, perhaps.'
Beecham accordingly took the orchestra through the passage again and when they finished asked Delius whether that was any better. He said that it was.
'Good,' said Beecham. 'You know there are no horns in that passage.'
He'd entertain a new thought as if it were his mother-in-law.
A woman wrote a letter to Corey Ford with the simple message:
'I hope you stay single and make some poor girl happy.'
The only thing that ever makes her look reasonable is distance.
When Abraham Lincoln asked Thaddeus Stevens whether his fellow politician, Cameron Simon, was an honest man, Stevens told the President:
'He wouldn't steal a red-hot stove.'
Shortly afterwards Stevens was asked to explain what he meant, and he agreed to withdraw the comment.
'I said that Cameron wouldn't steal a red-hot stove. I now withdraw that statement.'
That woman's had her face lifted so many times there's nothing left inside her shoes.
On the French revolutionary leader, Bertrand Barere:
'The vices of honest men are the virtues of Barere.' — Lord Macaulay
Is that his nose or is he eating a banana?
On Ernest Hemingway:
'Always willing to lend a helping hand to the one above him.'
You've got everything a man could wish for, madam, including a moustache and rippling biceps.
On the actor Geoffrey Steyne:
'Mr. Steyne's performance was the worst to be seen in the contemporary theatre.' — Heywood Broun The actor was so incensed that he took out a libel action, during the course of which Broun saw him in another show and started his review of his performance:
'Mr. Steyne's performance is not up to its usual standard.'
On personal malice:
'People tell me I say ill-natured things. I have a very weak voice; if I did not say ill-natured things no one would hear what I said.' — Samuel Rogers
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