The Whole World Book of Quotations collects comments, wit, and wisdom not to be found in any other quotation reference book. Most compendia focus on the familiar sayings of Western cultures, leaving out much of the world. In contrast, here you will find quotations from all parts of the globe and from people we hear little about. The result is a unique collection that fills a long-standing hole on our reference shelves. These unfamiliar quotations will add freshness to your writing, your speaking, and your thinking.To make it easy to find the right quote for the moment, or to compare the thoughts of divers people, these quotations have been arranged by subject. Read through such topics of universal interest as love, money, and art. Look for several alternative perspectives of politics, racism, and religion. The Whole World Book of Quotations does more than tell you who said what. It provides detailed biographies of all the people quoted so that you can put them in the context of history and philosophy, or look up their longer writings. Indeed, this book's Biographical Index will come in hand as a reference source in itself.In these pages you will find well over three thousand sayings from every kind of personactivists and kings, shamans and homemakers poets and generals (and some generals who were poets). For writers, students, and teachers sharing the wisdom of the world, The Whole World Book of Quotations is here to browse, consult, and enjoy.Sample quotations:”There are forty kinds of lunacy, but only one kind of common sense” --Bantu saying ”Pray for the dead, and fight like hell for the living.”-- Mother Jones (1830-1930) American labor organizer ”He left us and we rejoiced; then an even more unbearable person came.” --Arab proverb about guests

The Whole World Book Of Quotations: Wisdom From Women And Men Around The Globe Throughout The Centuries 3,000 Overlookd Quotations From Abigail Adams To Zoroaster

Petras, Kathryn

Petras, Ross

Reference

Basic Books

The creme de la crud of screen history "War! War! That's all you think of, Dick Plantagenet! You burner! You pillager!" --Virginia Mayo as Lady Edith to George Sanders in King Richard and the Crusaders (1954) "Visits? That would indicate visitors." --Army captain learning of alien visits in Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) "When I'm sitting here with you, I don't even think about the slime people." --Hero to heroine in The Slime People (1962) "Suck the coffin mushroom now." --The Ultimate Vampire (1991) "This is bad." --Leonardo DiCaprio as the you-know-what hits the you-know-what in Titanic (1997)

Stupid Movie Lines: The 776 Dumbest Things Ever Uttered on the Silver Screen

Humor & Entertainment

Humor

Villard

A connoisseur's compendium of Freudian slips, spoonerisms, double-talk, and utter bosh from famous and infamous figures past and present -- a complete course in anti-eloquence by the foot-in-mouth champions of all time.

The 776 Stupidest Things Ever Said

Puzzles & Games

Main Street Books

*Too lazy to drive to his girlfriend's house, a man ties helium balloons to a lawn chair--and ends up at 15,000 feet, closing the L. A. airport. *A Chinese contraception program causes the birth rate to rise when men are discovered taking birth control pills and unrolling condoms over their fingers--exactly as shown in the training film. *A gang of Norwegian thieves carefully uses explosives to open a safe--only to find the safe is filled with dynamite. . . In the national bestseller The 776 Stupidest Things Ever Said--over 200,000 copies in print--Ross and Kathryn Petras immortalized idiotic utterances by public figures and average citizens alike. But what about the doers out there, the people who didn't stop at speaking, but went right out and did something stupid instead? It's time to give credit where credit is due. The 176 Stupidest Things Ever Done is a hilarious collection of inane incidents, senseless stunts, farcical feats, and utterly asinine activities from throughout history, and around the globe. From Sam Goldwyn to Walter Mondale, Albert Einstein to Fabio, the board of General Motors to British Parliament, this comic compendium chronicles the stupidest acts, ideas, decisions, inventions, songs, and ad campaigns that the mind of modern man has been able to devise. The 176 Stupidest Things Ever Done is a non-stop barrage of belly laughs, conclusive proof that actions speak louder--and funnier--than words.

The 176 Stupidest Things Ever Done

A mother, answering her phone, hears her daughter shrieking and screaming. Terrified, she calls the police who arrive at the daughter's house, batter down the door--and find the daughter, nude, in her bedroom having sex with her boyfriend. Apparently her toe hit the automatic dial button for her mother's number on the bedroom phone.A man, swimming in a Florida pool, sees the pool intake pipe and gets a unique idea. Hours later, after police, firemen, and EMT personnel are called, the man is taken to an area hospital--along with ten feet of pipe attached to a very swollen part of his anatomy.A newly married couple in Turin set up a video camera in their bedroom to tape all of their honeymoon activities. But somehow certain crucial wires got crossed. While they were enjoying their honeymoon sex, so was everyone else in their apartment building: the couple had accidentally connected their camera to the building's cable television system.In the national bestseller The 776 Stupidest Things Ever Said Ross and Kathryn Petras immortalized idiotic utterances by public figures and average citizens alike. The 176 Stupidest Things Ever Done chronicled fiascoes, senseless stunts, and utterly asinine activities from around the globe. Now, Stupid Sex takes on the subject that no one can resist. It's about people who get caught in the act . . . and about people who get caught in the trash disposal. Stupid Sex tells two hundred true stories of extremely dumb (and very funny) sex acts arranged under headings ranging from Airplane Sex to Zoo Bathroom Sex.

Stupid Sex

Wretched writing is the lowest of the low; it is a felonious assault on the English language. Exuberantly excessive, it is a sin committed often by amateurs and all-too-frequently by gifted writers having an off day. In short, it’s very bad writing. Truly bad. Appallingly bad. It’s also very funny. A celebration of the worst writing imaginable, Wretched Writing includes inadvertently filthy book titles, ridiculously overwrought passages from novels, bombastic and confusing speeches, moronic oxymorons, hyperactive hyperbole, horribly inappropriate imagery in ostensibly hot sex scenes, mangled clichés, muddled metaphors, and unintended double entendres. Sit back and enjoy these deliciously dreadful samples, and try not to cringe too much.

Wretched Writing: A Compendium of Crimes Against the English Language

TarcherPerigee

For word nerds and grammar geeks, a witty guide to the most commonly mispronounced words, along with their correct pronunciations and pithy forays into their fascinating etymologies and histories of use and misuse. With wit and good humor, this handy little book not only saves us from sticky linguistic situations but also provides fascinating cocktail-party-ready anecdotes. Entries reveal how to pronounce boatswain like an old salt on the deck of a ship, trompe l'oeil like a bona fide art expert, and haricot vert like a foodie, while arming us with the knowledge of why certain words are correctly pronounced the "slangy" way (they came about before dictionaries), what stalks of grain have to do with pronunciation, and more. With bonus sidebars like "How to Sound like a Seasoned Traveler" and "How to Sound Cultured," readers will be able to speak about foreign foods and places, fashion, philosophy, and literature with authority.

You're Saying It Wrong: A Pronunciation Guide to the 150 Most Commonly Mispronounced Words--and Their Tangled Histories of Misuse

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

Ten Speed Press+

An entertaining and informative guide to the most common 150 words even smart people use incorrectly, along with pithy forays into their fascinating etymologies and tangled histories of use and misuse. Even the most erudite among us use words like apocryphal, facetious, ironic, meteorite, moot, redundant, and unique incorrectly every day. Don’t be one of them. Using examples of misuse from leading newspapers, prominent public figures and famous writers, among others, language gurus Ross Petras and Kathryn Petras explain how to avoid these perilous pitfalls in the English language. Each entry also includes short histories of how and why these mistake have happened, some of the (often surprisingly nasty) debates about which uses are (and are not) mistakes, and finally, how to use these words correctly … or why to not use them at all. By the end of this book, every literati will be able to confidently, casually, and correctly toss in an “a priori” or a “limns” without hesitation.

That Doesn't Mean What You Think It Means: The 150 Most Commonly Misused Words and Their Tangled Histories

From Bill Clinton's argument over the meaning of "it" to Bob Dole's crusade to wipe out erectile dysfunction, this collection of the 776 stupidest things uttered by senators, congressmen, presidents, and presidential candidates takes a humorous swipe at these serious characters. Original.

The Stupidest Things Ever Said by Politicians

Pocket

Only Retirement Guide You'll Ever Need

Written in a clear, step-by-step format, "The Only Retirement Guide You'll Ever Need" provides advice on such topics as annuities, pensions, and IRAs, retirement communities, starting your own business, managing health care, and retiring abroad.

Parenting & Relationships

Touchstone

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Books by Petras, Kathryn