Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes

by Clifton Fadiman

  LOUIS PHILIPPE (1773–1850), king of France (1830–48), known as the “Citizen King.”

  1 Fleeing from Paris in 1848, Louis Philippe climbed into the carriage that would take him into exile; an unknown man closed the door. “Thank you,” said the king absently. “Not at all,” replied the man. “I’ve waited eighteen years for this day.”

  LOWELL, Abbott Lawrence (1856–1943), US educator and lawyer.

  1 During William Howard Taft’s administration President Lowell was summoned from Harvard to the White House on business. In his absence his secretary received a visitor who asked where Lowell was. “The president is in Washington seeing Mr. Taft,” was the reply.

  LOWELL, Amy (1874–1925), US poet and critic.

  1 The Cabots, one of Boston’s leading families, were held in low esteem by Miss Lowell. She would go to the extent of refusing invitations to parties and dinners if she knew that one or more Cabots had also been invited. One day, as she set off for her annual trip to Europe aboard the Devonian, she happened to glance at the passenger list and promptly disembarked. “There are sixteen Cabots aboard the Devonian this trip,” she told a newspaper reporter, “and God isn’t going to miss such an opportunity.”

  2 At the time of the declaration of war in 1914 Miss Lowell was in London. Late for an appointment, hindered by the crowds in the street, indignant at the police for not helping her, as she returned to her hotel she burst out, “Don’t they know I’m Amy Lowell? And it was this month that my book of poems was coming out here! What attention will it get with this going on? What has happened to England? Why doesn’t she simply stop the war?”

  LOWELL, Robert (1917–77), US poet.

  1 Due to present the Duff Cooper Memorial Prize before an illustrious gathering that included Duff Cooper’s widow, Lady Diana, Lowell suffered a serious nervous breakdown and was taken to a mental home. A substitute was arranged, but at the last moment Lowell discharged himself and set off for the ceremony. Lady Diana’s son was informed of this and told that Lowell must on no account touch alcohol. He rushed to pass the news to his mother, and found her talking to Lowell, then on his third glass of champagne. “Darling,” she said brightly, “I’ve just been telling this gentleman how the principal speaker has lost his marbles and been carted off to a loony-bin!”

  2 As a punishment for refusing to serve in the army, Lowell was imprisoned for five months by the US courts. While waiting to be transferred to Connecticut to serve the sentence, Lowell spent a few days in New York’s West Street Jail. During his stay there he was put in a cell next to Louie Lepke, a convicted member of Murder Incorporated. “I’m in for killing,” Lepke told the poet. “What are you in for?” Lowell answered: “Oh, I’m in for refusing to kill.”

  3 Lowell’s first wife, novelist Jean Stafford, recalled that he revised his work so extensively that a poem he once began as “To Jean: On Her Confirmation” ended up as “To a Whore at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.”

  LUCAS, George (1944–). US film director.

  1 Lucas was vastly underpaid for his work on Star Wars. As a writer he received $50,000; as director, $100,000. But Lucas had arranged to retain merchandising and licensing rights — called “garbage” provisions — to his characters, a first in the film business. Star Wars, which was released in 1977, went on to become the most successful film up to that time in movie history, and Lucas a rich man. When the time came to do the sequel, The Empire Strikes Back, Lucas made sure he kept complete control over not just licensing but artistic choices and all other decisions as well. So tough were his terms — which the studio had to accept — that his negotiator, Tom Pollack, presented the contract to the head of Twentieth Century Fox with a flourish on Yom Kippur, saying, “This is your day of atonement.”

  2 Lucas cast nineteen-year-old Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia. But her character was to be a virginal innocent, so Lucas draped Fisher’s body in a long robe and even had her breasts taped to her chest, to accentuate Leia’s youthfulness. Fisher noted later, “No jiggling in the Empire.”

  3 Throughout the making of Star Wars novice actor Harrison Ford struggled with his dialogue, finally exploding to writer-director Lucas, “You can type this shit, George, but you sure can’t say it.”

  4 Told his Star Wars sequel, The Empire Strikes Back, lacked any kind of depth, he said, “If we have enough action, no one will notice.”

  LUCE, Clare Boothe (1903–87), US journalist, playwright, and politician, wife of Henry R. Luce.

  1 Lady Jeanne Campbell, the granddaughter of Lord Beaverbrook, worked as a researcher on Life and it was well known that Henry Luce was having an affair with her. It is said that he even went so far as to ask Clare for a divorce so that he could marry Jeanne. Clare replied that, curiously enough, Lord Beaverbrook had been showing considerable interest in her, and if she married him that would make her the grandmother of Luce’s intended bride. Luce decided against the marriage.

  2 A certain congressman, intending to flatter Mrs. Luce, said of her in the House of Representatives one day: “She has the best mind of any woman in the House.” Mrs. Luce was enraged by the patronizing tone of the compliment. “The mind knows no sex,” she retorted. “If the lady believes that,” remarked a second congressman, “she doesn’t know the mind of man.”

  3 Asked by a reporter to comment on a certain senator’s move from the Republican to the Democratic party, Mrs. Luce replied: “Whenever a Republican leaves one side of the aisle and goes to the other, it raises the intelligence quotient of both parties.”

  LUCE, Henry R. (1898–1967), US publisher, founder of the Time-Life publishing concern.

  1 Stanley Karnow, once based in Hong Kong for Time magazine, told Sterling Seagrave of a trip made to Taiwan with his boss Henry Luce. (Chiang Kai-shek had fled after losing China to the Communists. He had been, of course, a hero to Luce.) On their way to the Palace Hotel in Taipei, Luce noticed that their luggage seemed to be missing and muttered peevishly, “I think they’ve lost our bags.” Karnow commented, “It won’t be the first thing they’ve lost.”

  “Within a year,” Karnow told Seagrave, “I was no longer working for Time. ”

  LUCULLUS, Lucius Licinius (c. 114–57 BC), Ro-man general and statesman.

  1 Lucullus’s dinners became proverbial for their sumptuousness. On one of the rare occasions when Lucullus was dining alone, he noticed to his displeasure that the preparations for the meal were not up to their usual standard. He summoned the servant responsible, who explained that as no one had been invited, he had assumed that his master would want a less lavish meal. Lucullus frowned: “Do you not know that this evening Lucullus sups with Lucullus?”

  LULLY, Jean-Baptiste (1632–87), French composer.

  1 The baton used by a seventeenth-century conductor was a much longer and heavier affair than the little wand used today. On January 8, 1687, in the course of conducting a Te Deum, Lully struck his foot with his baton, injuring it so seriously that gangrene set in and he died ten weeks later.

  LUNT, Alfred (1893–1977), US actor who with his wife, Lynn Fontanne (1887–1983), constituted a famous husband-and-wife acting team.

  1 The Lunts made one motion picture, The Guardsman. On the day of the premier Lunt was ill and Fontanne went alone. She returned distraught. “Alfred, it was a total disaster,” she babbled. “I cannot imagine what they were thinking of. You were all right, just occasionally it looked as if you had thin lips, but in the close-ups of me all you could see were my nostrils, or else my eyelashes cast such a shadow that it looked as if I had great bags under my eyes, and my hair was a mess, a total mess, and there is something wrong with the sound that makes my voice sound like either a squeak or a groan …” She paused for breath. Lunt said thoughtfully, “Thin lips, eh?”

  2 In one of the plays in which they co-starred Lynn Fontanne had to hit Alfred Lunt across the face. A devoted wife, she tried for some time without bringing herself to do it. Everyone became exasperated as the scene stuck at that point. Finally L
unt burst out, “For God’s sake, you’re the lousiest actress I’ve ever played opposite.” Miss Fontanne, her hang-up overcome, struck him sharply. Thereafter at every performance, Lunt used to whisper, “Don’t be lousy, dear.”

  LUTHER, Martin (1483–1546), German Protestant theologian.

  1 Luther’s colleague, Philipp Melanchthon, vexed his more ebullient friend by his quiet and virtuous ways. “For goodness’ sake, why don’t you go and sin a little?” cried Luther in exasperation. “Doesn’t God deserve to have something to forgive you for!”

  2 Cornered by a persistent young theologian with the question of where God had been before the world was created, Luther snapped, “He was building hell for such presumptuous, fluttering, and inquisitive spirits as you are.”

  3 And to another overly inquisitive student who wanted to know what God had been doing before He created the world, Luther replied, “He sat under a birch tree cutting rods for those who ask nosy questions.”

  4 Arraigned for his heresies before the Diet of Worms in 1521, Luther refused to recant. “Hier stehe ich, ich kann nicht anders [Here I stand, I can do no other],” he declared.

  LYAUTEY, Louis Hubert Gonzalve (1854–1934), French general.

  1 After the war was over, Lyautey asked his gardener to plant a tree in a particular part of his estate. The gardener objected that the tree the marshal had chosen was particularly slow-growing and would not reach maturity for at least a century. The marshal replied, “In that case, there is no time to lose. Plant it this afternoon.”

  LYCURGUS (7th century BC), Spartan statesman.

  1 Lycurgus is credited with having created the Spartan constitution, with its strict military discipline and repressive state control of the peasantry. When someone asked why it was that he had not made the constitution of Sparta a democratic one, Lycurgus retorted, “Try the experiment in your own family.”

  LYNDHURST, John Singleton Copley, Lord (1772–1863), British lawyer; lord chancellor (1827–28, 1834–35, 1841–46).

  1 A society lady asked Lord Lyndhurst whether he believed in platonic friendship between men and women. “After, not before,” replied his lordship.

  LYTTON, Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron (1803–73), British novelist and politician.

  1 When Wilkie Collins’s detective novel The Woman in White appeared in 1860, it created a considerable stir. A feature much remarked upon was the villain, Count Fosco. One lady reader, however, was not so impressed and wrote to tell Collins, “You really do not know a villain. Your Count Fosco is a very poor one.” She then offered to supply Collins with a villain next time he wanted one. “Don’t think that I am drawing upon my imagination. The man is alive and constantly under my gaze. In fact, he is my husband.” The writer was Bulwer-Lytton’s wife.

  M

  MABLY, Gabriel Bonnet, Abbé de (1709–85), French political writer and philosopher.

  1 It was proposed to Mably that he campaign for election to the French Academy. He replied, “If I were a member, people would ask: ‘Why is he there?’ I prefer them to ask: ‘Why is he not there?’”

  McCARTHY, Joseph R[aymond] (1908–57), US politician.

  1 Senator McCarthy stalked out of a congressional committee room in a rage, to be met by a bevy of reporters who asked him to comment upon a shocking allegation that had just been made. “Why, it’s the most unheard-of thing I’ve ever heard of,” McCarthy exploded.

  McCORMACK, John (1884–1945), US operatic tenor, born in Ireland.

  1 McCormack was noted for his performance as the naval officer Pinkerton in Madame Butterfly. Having watched a production of the opera by a different company, he sought out the tenor playing Pinkerton and told him, “You sang very well but you must have been a rotten naval officer.” The tenor looked puzzled. “You began with a little bit of braid on your sleeve,” continued McCormack, “then, years later, when you return to Japan and your little Butterfly, you’re still wearing the same bit of braid. Don’t you ever get promoted? When I sang Pinkerton I took good care to promote myself to commander in the third act.”

  McCORMICK, Edith Rockefeller (1872–1932), daughter of John D. Rockefeller.

  1 Edith McCormick always maintained a large staff in her huge and magnificent house. One rule applied to all of them, from the first butler to the personal maid’s assistant: they were not permitted to speak to her. Only once was that rule broken. One evening in 1901, when Edith McCormick’s young son was suffering from scarlet fever, a dinner party was in progress at the family’s country retreat in Lake Forest. During the meal the news arrived that the unfortunate boy had died. Following a discussion in the servants’ quarters, the tragic news was whispered to Mrs. McCormick at the table. Mrs. McCormick merely nodded her head, and the dinner party continued without pause.

  McCOY, Kid [Norman Selby] (1873–1940), US welterweight boxer, world champion.

  1 The expression “the real McCoy” originated in a barroom brawl, when a drunk insisted that the boxer was not who he said he was. McCoy flattened his opponent, who struggled back onto his feet and said, “It’s the real McCoy.”

  2 (P. G. Wodehouse, having watched Kid McCoy training at a gymnasium at White Plains, impulsively asked if he could step into the ring with him. The world champion agreed and he and Wodehouse began to make themselves ready for the bout, when McCoy suddenly laughed.)

  “He had been reminded, he said, of an entertaining incident in his professional career, when he was fighting a contender who had the misfortune to be stone deaf. It was not immediately that he became aware of the other’s affliction, but when he did he acted promptly and shrewdly. As the third round entered its concluding stages he stepped back a pace and pointed to his adversary’s corner, to indicate to him that the bell had rung, which of course was not the case but far from it.

  “ ‘Oh, thank you so much,’ said the adversary, ‘Very civil of you.’

  “He dropped his hands and turned away, whereupon Kid McCoy immediately knocked him out.”

  McCULLERS, Carson (1917–67), US novelist and playwright.

  1 Carson McCullers’s mother was on a bus en route to visit her daughter in New York when she fell into conversation with a lady of aristocratic mien who said she was fond of reading. The proud mother immediately began a lengthy monologue on her daughter’s extraordinary literary talents. After some time the other woman mentioned that her father had also been a writer. Carson’s mother asked her name. “Countess Tolstoy,” was the answer.

  2 McCullers was a great admirer of Katherine Anne Porter, whom she once pointed out to a friend as “the greatest female writer in America now — but just wait until next year.” They found themselves together at the writer’s colony Yaddo, where McCullers tried to meet her. Porter, who disliked her, refused to answer repeated knocks on her door, despite McCullers’s calling out, “I do love you so much.” Dinner was served at 6:30, and residents were expected to attend on time. Thinking she heard McCullers walking away down the hall, she opened her door only to find the young writer prostrate across her doorstep, waiting silently. “I had had enough,” Porter later recalled. “I merely stepped over her and continued on my way to dinner. And that was the last time she ever bothered me.”

  3 McCullers shared a house in Brooklyn Heights with a revolving cast of characters that included, at one time or another, Benjamin Britten, Gypsy Rose Lee, W. H. Auden, Louis MacNeice, and a chimpanzee. One Thanksgiving Day the group was roused from their post-dinner stupor by the screaming sounds of a fire engine. They all ran down the street to find the fire, but suddenly McCullers stopped and grabbed Gypsy Rose Lee’s arm, shouting, “Frankie is in love with her brother and the bride, and wants to become a member of the wedding!” Both walked silently home, McCullers trembling and Lee aware that the writer had suddenly broken through to her muse.

  McGRAW, Frank “Tug” (1944–), US baseball player.

  1 “Tug” played for the Mets during the 1973 season, when the team was slumping in epic pr
oportion. As he walked onto the field one day, an autograph seeker called out, “What’s with the Mets?” McGraw turned and said, “There’s nothing wrong with the Mets — you gotta believe!” The retort quickly became the rallying cry for the team and was eagerly embraced by fans and press, continuing today.

  2 Pitcher McGraw often became unduly anxious about his pitches, especially in crucial situations. Eventually he developed a philosophy that worked every time: just before a pitch he would think to himself, “In a billion years the sun is going to burn out and the earth will become a frozen iceball hurtling through space. And when that happens, nobody’s going to care what [any great hitter] does with the bases loaded.”

  McKINLEY, William B. (1843–1901), US politician; 25th President of the United States (1897–1901).

  1 On a visit to Niagara Falls in 1901, McKin-ley was careful to walk only halfway along the bridge connecting the United States with Canada. He simply didn’t want to be the first President to leave the boundaries of the United States during his term of office.

  2 On September 6, 1901, while greeting people at an official reception at Buffalo, McKinley was shot at point-blank range by an anarchist named Leon Czolgosz. McKinley slumped in a chair, his first thoughts for the safety of his assailant, who was being tackled by people nearby, and his second thoughts for his wife, Ida, a semi-invalid who suffered from seizures. “My wife,” he gasped, “be careful how you tell her.” He was taken to a hospital where he lingered for a few days. His wife was at his bedside as his end approached. “I want to go too, I want to go too,” she sobbed. “We are all going,” said McKinley faintly. He did not speak again.