A Quote by Stephen Leacock

Most people can tire of a lecture in fifteen minutes, clever people can do it in five, and sensible people don't go to lectures at all.

Stephen Leacock

Quote Topics

Clever Clever People Fifteen Five Go Lecture Lectures Minutes Most People Sensible Tire

Quote Author

Stephen Leacock
Canadian - Economist
December 30, 1869 - March 28, 1944

Most people tire of a lecture in ten minutes; clever people can do it in five. Sensible people never go to lectures at all. But the people who do go to a lecture and who get tired of it, presently hold it as a sort of grudge against the lecturer personally. In reality his sufferings are worse than theirs.

Stephen Leacock

In the future, everyone will have fifteen minutes of fame. Followed by fifteen minutes of legal problems, fifteen minutes of ridicule from late-night TV hosts, fifteen minutes of obscurity, and fifteen minutes of "Where are they now?".

Dan Piraro

This is unusual for me. I have given readings and not lectures. I have told people who ask for lectures that I have no lecture to give. And that is true.

V. S. Naipaul

Sydney: I can do a lot of things, Adrian. And—at the risk of sounding egotistical —I mean, well, I can do a lot of pretty awesome things that most people can’t." Adrian: “Don’t I know it. You can change a tire in ten minutes while speaking Greek.” Sydney: “Five minutes.

Richelle Mead

I never lecture, not because I am shy or a bad speaker, but simply because I detest the sort of people who go to lectures and don't want to meet them.

H. L. Mencken

People perceive me as a commodity. They just don't think anything of asking for five minutes of my time. It never occurs to them that if they're asking for it and another thousand people are asking, I don't have 1,000 five minutes to give.

Stephen Jay Gould

Amy: "Can I come?" Doctor: "Not safe in here, not yet. Five minutes. Give me five minutes and I'll be right back." Amy: "People always say that." Doctor: "Am I people?...Do I even look like people?...Trust me, I'm the Doctor.

Steven Moffat

People may see us on TV for only five minutes - but there's a lot going on behind that five minutes. There's 15 hours of work around it.

Maryse Mizanin

Five minutes of planning are worth fifteen minutes of just looking.

E. L. Konigsburg

An hour show panics me a lot less than five minutes at the O2. How do you put yourself across and make sure people have a good time in five minutes?

Aisling Bea

The only thing that shocks me is public interest in people who shouldn't be interesting at all, like Jade Goody. We've gone past Andy Warhol and all those clever, arty and witty things that were done and said in the sixties...the fifteen minutes, and so on. Now your celebrities don't have to do anything, they're just voted in. And that shocks me.

Marco Pirroni

People have now a-days got a strange opinion that every thing should be taught by lectures. Now, I cannot see that lectures can do as much good as reading the books from which the lectures are taken.

Samuel Johnson

People say they wish they were Michael Jordan. OK, do it for a year. Do it for two years. Do it for five years. When you get past the fun part, then go do the part where you get into cities at three a.m. and you have fifteen people waiting for autographs when you're as tired as hell.

Michael Jordan

If all the good people were clever And all the clever people were good The world would be nicer than ever We thought that it possibly could. But somehow, 'tis seldom or ner The two hit it off as they should The good are so harsh to the clever The clever so rude to the good!