Read it and weep! M.Thatch voted top female Wit!

That top ten in full:

1 Oscar Wilde “Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast”

2 Spike Milligan “All I ask is the chance to prove that money can’t make me happy”

3 Stephen Fry “An original idea. That can’t be too hard. The library must be full of them”

4 Jeremy Clarkson “Speed has never killed anyone, suddenly becoming stationary . . . that’s what gets you”

5 Sir Winston Churchill “A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen”

6 Paul Merton “I’m always amazed to hear of air crash victims so badly mutilated that they have to be identified by their dental records. If they don’t know who you are, how do they know who your dentist is?”

7 Noel Coward “People are wrong when they say opera is not what it used to be. It is what it used to be. That is what’s wrong with it.”

8 Shakespeare “Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them, they want everything”

9 Brian Clough “The River Trent is lovely, I know because I have walked on it for 18 years”

10 Liam Gallagher “She [Victoria Beckham] cannot even chew gum and walk in a straight line at the same time, let alone write a book.”

ware 2 start

p.s. no peter fucking cook, no credibility

Clarkson's high ranking might just have had something to do with this poll being done by "Dave" - or UKTV G2 as it was formerly known.

Liam Callagher? And the example of his "wit" is the oldest joke in the book.

Liam Gallagher is often funny, occasionally intentionally, but not witty.

Oscar Wilde was never as pithy as "What's it to you, cuntybollox?"

all of those are shit.

vivian stanshall another lamented absentee

nrq has anything in history ever impressed you?

quitney plz 2 provide yr top 10 witty raconteurs kthx

hang on! Elephant in the room here!

In what parallell universe is M>Thatch considered witty, let alone the top female wit of all time? Hmm?

The Toryverse, where Jeremy Clarkson is wittier than all but three people in the country.

Your Majesty is like a stream of bat's piss.

Thatch's lack of wit is famous. There's some story about some Labour politician comparing himself to Moses, her speechwriters wrote the line "my advice to him is, keep taking the tablets". She wanted to change it to "keep taking the pills".

hang on! Elephant in the room here!

In what parallell universe is M>Thatch considered witty, let alone the top female wit of all time? Hmm?

yeah, we know, we were ignoring it. it isn't even worth debating.

Walking and chewing gum:
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0402a&L=ads-l&P=4698
(1967, before liam was born)

jeremy clarkson appears to be channeling douglas adams as well.

Not defending her position on any kind of poll, but the rather deadpan way she delivered some of those lines (uturn, dead parrot etc) made them funny, even if it was because she didn't understand the joke herself.

nrq has anything in history ever impressed you?

-- J.D., Monday, October 15, 2007 10:35 AM (25 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

yes. you reading the wrong threads.

that's not very witty, though, is it?

Thatch's lack of wit is famous.

She was grebt at slapstick.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyoooi1IqiQ

1 Oscar Wilde “Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast”

oh how languid

2 Spike Milligan “All I ask is the chance to prove that money can’t make me happy”

this one's okay

3 Stephen Fry “An original idea. That can’t be too hard. The library must be full of them”

dire

4 Jeremy Clarkson “Speed has never killed anyone, suddenly becoming stationary . . . that’s what gets you”

dickhead

5 Sir Winston Churchill “A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen”

fat fascist fuck

6 Paul Merton “I’m always amazed to hear of air crash victims so badly mutilated that they have to be identified by their dental records. If they don’t know who you are, how do they know who your dentist is?”

duh

7 Noel Coward “People are wrong when they say opera is not what it used to be. It is what it used to be. That is what’s wrong with it.”

not sure where he's coming from. it's fucking noel coward, who's he to get snooty?

8 Shakespeare “Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them, they want everything”

terrible

9 Brian Clough “The River Trent is lovely, I know because I have walked on it for 18 years”

waht

10 Liam Gallagher “She [Victoria Beckham] cannot even chew gum and walk in a straight line at the same time, let alone write a book.”

liam has done much better than this

milligan quote pretty run of the mill strange.

churchill much wittier, in general.

at least 6 is recogniseable as a joeke.

noel coward and shakespeare are capable of delights, to be fair. the selections here are probably 'dumbed-down' all-purpose ones, rather than moments of genuinely witty insight that the man on the street might not get.

churchill was fairly witty at times, but he was also a twat of the most profound order.

That clip of thatcher conking out is so fucking weird! I haven't seen it in 10 years at least. She looks like a robot who's batteries have just ran flat.

shakespeare was never funny, come on.

haha, the top two are Irish not British (though I think Oscar Wilde had dual nationality, Milligan definitely didn't).

I think the Milligan quote is the best of those. And Shakespeare definitely has funny moments in his plays.

Iago alone has about 15 genuinely funny lines!

anyway, yeah a bad selection of quotes, in short.

#2 vs #5: hating Pakistanis vs hating Jews: what makes you funnier?

the answer is of course, neither of them make the slightest difference in how funny you actually are.

What about hating the Dutch?

Shakespeare is hilarious, but it's all about the play not one-liners, you have to get in the rhythm and all that. Merry Wives is very funny. Titus Andronicus is unintentionally funny if not done properly.

last scene of titus andronicus is like looney tunes gone psycho

plucking out vile jellies ===> classic.

Once at a social gathering, Gladstone said to Disraeli, "I predict, Sir, that you will die either by hanging or of some vile disease". Disraeli replied, "That all depends, sir, upon whether I embrace your principles or your mistress."

-- Benjamin Disraeli

actually one of the great zings, thanks for that! :D

Winston Churchill, on being told by Bessie Braddock MP: "Winston, You're drunk!" he replied "Bessie, You're ugly. But in the morning I shall be sober."

I prefer the "If you were my wife I'd drink it" one, myself.

Danny Baker = both witty and sidesplittingly actually funny in his prime. I'd have him top.

most one-liners are not particularly funny if you stick them in a list like this and invite you to admire how funny they are.

I read that xpost as "I'd have him on top" but ho.

GET ONE DR. JOHNSON, MORANS!

get one good book of quotations- only Disraeli gets any points so far on this thread.

G.B Shaw? Thomas Beecham? Max Beerbohm? Sydney Smith? No, Liam Gallagher... Noel's much wittier for a start!

no wodehouse, no joe orton.