English wit in crisis - Clarkson 4th wittiest Englishman.

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.”

JKLever wrote:Weren't Oscar wilde & Spike Milligan oirish?

tac wrote:Who is surprised to find LLL reading Wilde's complete works? Looking for the dirty bits, no doubt.

taipan wrote:

JKLever wrote:Weren't Oscar wilde & Spike Milligan oirish?

So much so that Spike could never get a British passport.

Gary 111 wrote:I wouldn't have thought Winston Churchill was a barrel of laughs either.

And Liam Gallagher? All his best lines were written for him by Noel for a start.

Though these surveys are usually made by someone walking around Iceland with a clipboard.

doctorspin wrote:
Nixon's actual words were...."I am not a criminal" so actually, it's surprising that Ol' Tricky Dicky himself isn't somewhere near the top of this current Witty Guy poll.

Gary 111 wrote:I wouldn't have thought Winston Churchill was a barrel of laughs either.

And Liam Gallagher? All his best lines were written for him by Noel for a start.

Though these surveys are usually made by someone walking around Iceland with a clipboard.

taipan wrote:

doctorspin wrote:
Nixon's actual words were...."I am not a criminal" so actually, it's surprising that Ol' Tricky Dicky himself isn't somewhere near the top of this current Witty Guy poll.

Close to "I did not have sex with that woman"

Lara Lara Laughs wrote:

Gary 111 wrote:I wouldn't have thought Winston Churchill was a barrel of laughs either.

And Liam Gallagher? All his best lines were written for him by Noel for a start.

Though these surveys are usually made by someone walking around Iceland with a clipboard.

Are you joking? Churchill was the man.

Churchill quotes:

From now on, ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put.

He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.

I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.

Don't talk to me about naval tradition. It's nothing but rum, sodomy and the lash.


And there's that famous Churchill at a party one.

Some woman: Winston, you're drunk!

Winston: Ah yes, but in the mourning I shall be sober whereas you shall always be ugly.


And:

Some woman: If I were your wife I'd poison your tea.

Winston: If you were my wife, I'd drink it.