The New Penguin Dictionary of Quotations [antikvár]

Foreword to the New Edition The opportunity to prepare a new edition of The Penguin Dictionary of Quotations a generation later than our first has allowed great expansion of the entries drawn from the twentieth century but the loss of only a handful of lines that now seem to us to have rolled over the edge of memorability. This has meant that where Winston Churchill, G. K, Chesterton, W. H. Auden and a number of other highly quotable contributors found themselves uncomfortably straddled between this dictionary and its sister-volume. The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Quotations, we have now been able to include all the most memorable and best-remembered lines from such writers in this dictionary. Yet The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Quotations - since it is devoted solely to the twentieth century -can serve up not only all these classic lines but also a generous helping of the less familiar phrases from the same writers. Then. too. our first edition was published in mid-century and was sound and middle-aged in its quotationary choice. But, now the century is so elderly, people's memories have become less literary and more quirky. So television, the cinema, advertising, graffiti rightly have their say. In the foreword to our first edition we were doubt- ful that there would be phrase-making politicians in the future. Westminster and Washington cannot be said to reverberate with oratory, but along with one of our new entrants we have needed to do a U-tum. even if it would be an exaggeration to say that Margaret Thatcher and President Reagan rub shoulders with Edmund Burke and Franklin D. Roosevelt as phrase-makers. So while the book continues to provide, we hope, an unrivalled feast of the classical quotations that form the staple of our literary and popular culture, it has been enriched by a new range of flavours. Not surprisingly, it has put on a good deal of weight in the process, and we are grateful for having been allowed to let out its jacket accordingly. The editor and the publisher are always grateful to receive comments, suggestions for inclusion (to this and its sister volume. The Penguin Dictionary of Twentieth Century Quotations), and a note of corrections or omissions from our readers. Please send all correspondence to M. J. Cohen, c/o The Managing Editor. Penguin Books, 27 Wrights Lane. London W8 5TZ. J.M.C. M.J.C. 1991