Editorial note

This page was initially posted shortly after MIT debuted https://wikis.mit.edu. Its intent was to allow people to become familiar with using the wiki by sharing something fun.

How do I use this wiki thing?

...

We have discovered that we very rarely make sense. Almost never. It begins to seem that making sense is a skill not unlike the playing of the violin. It can, of course, be done, but no one simply falls into the habit of playing the violin. Even those who can do it, do it only by deliberate design. They don't just find themselves doing it without having intended to. It requires some special focusing, some stern singleness of purpose. - The Underground Grammarian

"I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence? - R.I.P. George Carlin

Le désir de l'ordre est en même temps désir de mort, parce que la vie est perpétuelle violation de l'ordre. - Milan Kundera (source and context at http://www.gilles-jobin.org/citations/?P=k&au=203)

From an email that keeps going around:

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

I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great
pleasure.
– Clarence Darrow

He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the
dictionary.
– William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway)

Ive had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasnt it.
– Groucho Marx

I didnt attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved
of it.
– Mark Twain

He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.
– Oscar Wilde

I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a
friend ... if you have one.
– George Bernard Shaw to Winston Churchill
followed by Churchills response:
Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second, if there is
one.
– Winston Churchill

I feel so miserable without you; its almost like having you here.
– Stephen Bishop

He is a self-made man and worships his creator.
– John Bright

He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others.
– Samuel Johnson

He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up.
– Paul Keating

He had delusions of adequacy.
– Walter Kerr

Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on
it?
– Mark Twain

His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.
– Mae West

Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.
– Oscar Wilde

Lady Astor once remarked to Winston Churchill at a dinner party,
"Winston, if you were my husband, I would poison your coffee!"
"Churchill replied, Madam, if I were your husband I would drink it!"