A Quotable Quiz – With Answer Key

 

Gene C. Mage

 

March 2nd, 2004

 

Great leaders are able to think across boundaries.  They search far-and-wide for new reading material to enhance their intellectual breadth.  A familiarity with the great thinkers and personalities of history allows one to enjoy conversation with people from a variety of cultures and backgrounds.

 

How well-read are you?  Can you identify who said the following famous (or not-so-famous) quotes from history and literature?  Test your mettle against the wit and wisdom of these prolific pontificators.  Match each profundity with the right “who said it”.  You may check your answers on my website www.makingitwork.com.

 

1.      “What is to give life must endure burning.”

a.       The Reverend Louis Farrakhan

b.      Jesus Christ

c.       Viktor Frankl

d.      Mel Gibson

 

2.      “We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.”

a.       President George W. Bush

b.      French President Jacques Chirac

c.       UN Secretary General Kofi Annan

d.      Dr. Martin Luther King

3.      “I will praise any man that will praise me.”

a.       William Shakespeare

b.      Keith Richards

c.       Michael Jackson

d.      Warren Beatty

 

4.      "Demoralize the enemy from within by surprise, terror, sabotage, assassination. This is the war of the future."

a.       Osama Bin Laden

b.      Yasser Arafat

c.       Saddam Hussein

d.      Adolph Hitler

 

5.      "To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered."

a.       Martin Sheen

b.      Jennifer Anniston

c.       Voltaire

d.      Michael Moore

6.      “An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it.”

a.       Senator John Kerry

b.      Mahatma Gandhi

c.       Representative Nancy Pelosi

d.      Senator Edward Kennedy



7.      “We dare not tempt them with weakness. For only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed.”

a.       Senator Barry Goldwater

b.      President George W. Bush

c.       President John F. Kennedy

d.      Dictator Joseph Stalin

 

8.      “I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy.”

a.       Mark Twain

b.      Dr. Howard Dean

c.       Franz Kafka

d.      Rosie O’Donnell

 

9.       “Nobody can understand this country without understanding the African American experience.”

a.       The Reverend Jesse Jackson

b.      President George W. Bush

c.       Representative Sheila Jackson Lee

d.      Dr. Martin Luther King

10.  "Words build bridges into unexplored regions."

a.       Ralph Waldo Emerson

b.      Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton

c.       The Poet Maya Angelou

d.      Adolph Hitler

 

 

11.   ‘No government can love a child, and no policy can substitute for a family's care.”

a.       The Reverend Jerry Fallwell

b.      Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton

c.       The Reverend Pat Robertson

d.      Dr. James Dobson

 

 

12.  “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.”

a.       Mark Twain

b.      Will Rogers

c.       Winston Churchill

d.      Plato

 



13.  “The less people know about what is really going on, the easier it is to wield power and authority.”

a.       Vice President Dick Cheney

b.      Dan Rather

c.       Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld

d.      Prince Charles

 

14.  “The business of America is business.”

a.       Enron CEO Kenneth Lay

b.      General Motors CEO Alfred P. Sloan, Jr.

c.       President Calvin Coolidge

d.      Ford CEO Henry Ford II

 

 

15.  “In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy.”

a.       Buddha

b.      Mahatma Gandhi

c.       William Blake

d.      Confucius

 

 

16.  “To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.”

a.       Whitney Huston

b.      Anthony Robbins

c.       Dr. Phil McGraw

d.      Oscar Wilde

 

17.  “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal.”

a.       T.S. Eliot

b.      Robert Frost

c.       Maya Angelou

d.      G. K. Chesterton

 

 

18.  “The hardest thing in the world to understand, is income tax.”

a.       Representative Dick Armey

b.      President George W. Bush

c.       Economist Robert J. Samuelson

d.      Physicist Albert Einstein

__________________________________________________________________________________

 

ANSWER KEY:

 

1:  c. (Holocaust survivor, Austrian Psychologist Viktor Frankl, author of Man’s Search for Meaning.)

2:  d. (Dr. Martin Luther King, “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” April 16th, 1963)

3:  a. (William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, II:6)

4:  d. (Adolph Hitler)

5:  c. (Voltaire)

6:  b. (Mahatma Gandhi, per Sisella Bok)

7:  c. (President John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961)

8:  c. (Franz Kafka (1883-1924) Czech novelist.  Diaries)

9:  b. (President George W. Bush, Radio Address, February 9th, 2002)
10:  d. (Adolph Hitler)

11:  b. (New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York Magazine, Apr 3, 2000)

12:  d. (Plato, as quoted by Des MacHale, Wisdom, London, 2002)

13:  d. (Prince Charles)

14:  c. (Calvin Coolidge)
15:  c. (British poet William Blake (1757 – 1827), The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, ‘Proverbs of Hell’)
16:  d. (Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband, III.)

17:  a. (US-born British poet and dramatist T.S. Eliot (1888-1965) Philip Massinger)

18:  d. (German-born US physicist Albert Einstein (1879-1955))

 

 

Syndicated columnist Gene C. Mage is author of the book Managing for High Performance.  Visit www.makingitwork.com for the column archive.

 

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