Dorothy Parker on humor

Guns aren’t lawful; nooses give; gas smells awful. So you might as well live.

If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn’t be a bit surprised.

Love is like quicksilver in the hand. Leave the fingers open and it stays. Clutch it, and it darts away.

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.

George Bernard Shaw1856–1950The Doctor’s Dilemma (1911), Act V

• Life & Death

Humor is the great thing, the saving thing. The minute it crops up, all our irritation and resentments slip away, and a sunny spirit takes their place.

Mark Twain1835–1910“What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us?” (1897)

You can turn painful situations around through laughter. If you can find humor in anything, even poverty, you can survive it.

Bill Cosbyborn 1937