Isaac Asimov on comedy

Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It’s the transition that’s troublesome.

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka!’ (I found it!) but ‘That’s funny…’

Why is it that you physicists always require so much expensive equipment? Now the Department of Mathematics requires nothing but money for paper, pencils, and erasers…and the Department of Philosophy is better still. It doesn’t even ask for erasers.

Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

Those are my principles. If you don’t like them I have others.

Groucho Marx1890–1977

A guy could have one major limb lying on the ground a full ten feet from the rest of his body, and he’d claim it was ‘just a sprain’.

Dave Barryborn 1947

• Dave Barry