February 01

"Corporations cannot commit treason, nor be outlawed, nor excommunicated, for they have no souls."

Sir Edward Coke
(02/01/1552 – 09/03/1634)
English jurist

"The happiest lot for a man, as far as birth is concerned, is that it should be such as to give him but little occasion to think much about it."

Richard Whately
(02/01/1787 – 10/08/1863)
English archbishop

"Life is obstinate and clings closest where it is most hated."

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
(08/30/1797 – 02/01/1851)
English writer (was married to Percy Bysshe Shelley)
("Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus")

"Depth must be hidden. Where? On the surface."

Hugo von Hofmannsthal
(02/01/1874 – 07/15/1929)
Austrian writer
("The Lord Chandos Letter")

"Explosions are not comfortable."

Yevgeny Zamyatin
(02/01/1884 – 03/10/1937)
Russian writer
("We")

"When in doubt, make a western."

John Ford
(02/01/1894 – 08/31/1973)
US filmmaker
("The Searchers")

"A good general rule is to state that the bouquet is better than the taste, and vice versa."

Stephen Potter
(02/01/1900 – 12/02/1969)
English writer , on wine tasting
("Gamesmanship")

"I worked like a son of a bitch to learn a few tricks and I fight like a steer to avoid getting stuck with parts I can't play."

Clark Gable
(02/01/1901 – 11/16/1960)
US actor (was married to Carole Lombard)

"No woman can be handsome by the force of features alone, any more than she can be witty by only the help of speech."

Langston Hughes
(02/01/1901 – 05/22/1967)
US writer
("The Ways of White Folks")

"God, whom you doubtless remember as that quaint old subordinate of General Douglas MacArthur..."

S. J. Perelman
(02/01/1904 – 10/17/1979)
US screenwriter
("The Beauty Part")

"A special effect is as big a star as any in the world."

George Pal
(02/01/1908 – 05/02/1980)
Hungarian animator , after seeing "Star Wars"

"I don't like to write, but I love to have written."

Michael Kanin
(02/01/1910 – 03/12/1993)
US writer (brother of Garson Kanin)

"Parents learn a lot from their children about coping with life."

Dame Muriel Spark
(02/01/1918 – 04/13/2006)
Scottish writer
("The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie")

"You can build a throne with bayonets, but you can't sit on it for long."

Boris Yeltsin
(02/01/1931 – 04/23/2007)
Russian politician

"Old men need applause too."

Don Everly
(02/01/1937 – )
US singer

"I thought it was in terribly bad taste for him to die when he did."

Terry Jones
(02/01/1942 – 01/21/2020)
English comic, actor (Monty Python's Flying Circus) , on Graham Chapman's dying on the eve of the Pythons' 20th anniversary

"You only live a short time... and you are dead a long time."

Johan Huizinga
(12/07/1872 – 02/01/1945)
Dutch historian
("The Autumn of the Middle Ages")

"If my kids could wish each other into the cornfield, as it were, they'd LIVE there. I mean, they'd be in that cornfield all the time."

Bill Mumy
(02/01/1954 – )
US actor, musician (Lost in Space...)

"The thing I found incredible about Los Angeles was the flagrant inequality. You'd be on the Sunset Strip with people dangerously close to attacking you for money while all these Rolls-Royces were going by."

Exene Cervenka
(02/01/1956 – )
US (ex-"X") singer (was married to—and bandmates with—John Doe, was married to Viggo Mortenson)

"Another dirty shirttail actor from New York."

Hedda Hopper
(05/02/1885 – 02/01/1966)
US gossip columnist , on James Dean (Hopper painted by Red Skelton)

"No man can be a genius in slapshoes and a flat hat."

Buster Keaton
(10/04/1895 – 02/01/1966)
US comic actor

"That's part of the problem with my love life. I'm looking for someone similar to him and nobody could ever compare."

Lisa Marie Presley
(02/01/1968 – )
US pop royalty (daughter of Elvis, was married to Michael Jackson, Nicolas Cage)

"I'm Jewish. I've always had a thing where it's okay to dance with the devil, just don't become the devil. Even at my peak, I never went too over the top."

Pauly Shore
(02/01/1968 – )
US comic

"Every tool carries with it the spirit by which it had been created."

Werner Karl Heisenberg
(12/05/1901 – 02/01/1976)
German physicist

"Are tectonic plates dishwasher-safe?"

Herb Caen
(04/03/1916 – 02/01/1997)
US columnist (SF Chronicle)

"I'm sorry, if you continue to complain, I will have to cancel your subscription."

Art Hoppe
(04/23/1925 – 02/01/2000)
US columnist (SF Chronicle)

"If you have to make mistakes, make them good and big; don't be middling if you can help it."

Hildegard Knef
(12/28/1925 – 02/01/2002)
German actor, singer

"[He] openly said women should be kept in concentration camps for breeding purposes only—that's all we were good for."

Irish McCalla
(12/25/1928 – 02/01/2002)
US actor , on Carl Junghans, her director in "River Goddesses"

"Melody is a form of remembrance. It must have a quality of inevitability in our ears."

Giancarlo Menotti
(07/07/1911 – 02/01/2007)
Italian composer

"I'm not the type to get ulcers. I give them."

Edward Koch
(12/12/1924 – 02/01/2013)
US mayor (NYC), People's Court judge