Cynical Quotes [2] Trivia Quiz

Answer: Friedrich Nietzsche

The U.S. version is "My mind is made up. Don't confuse me with the facts."

Answer: Oscar Wilde

Oscar also said, "Anybody can sympathize with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature, it requires, in fact, that nature of a true individualist, to sympathize with a friend's success."

Answer: Andy Warhol

From a 1968 exhibition in Sweden.

Answer: H. L. Mencken

Mencken was not impressed by the American public. He had particular contempt for the American South, which he called the "Desert of the Bozart."

Answer: Samuel Johnson

Johnson was an abolitionist, and he was arguing his position against James Boswell, who was convinced that slavery was a positive good ordained by God. At the time, the American colonists were complaining that the British government was taxing them without representation, and Johnson neatly skewered what he considered to be American hypocrisy.

Answer: Dorothy Parker

Parker's theater criticism was full of sharp, pointed one-liners. Later in life, she reviewed books for The New Yorker, using the pen name of Constant Reader. In her review of A.A. Milne's "House at Pooh Corner," she informed everyone that, while reading Milne's book, "Tonstant weader fwowed up."

Answer: Robert E. Lee

After the Civil War, Lee had no interest in war memorials. The Gettysburg Battlefield Association asked him for help in their battlefield memorial project. He refused, claiming that he was too busy and added that he wouldn't be able to help much, even if he had had the time. Lee further noted that, "I think it wiser moreover not to keep open the sores of war; but to follow the example of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife and to commit to oblivion the feelings it engendered."

Answer: Arnaud Amaury

According to the account of Caesarius of Heisterbach, the crusaders demanded that Beziers surrender all the heretics. The citizens refused, and the crusaders took the city. Then the crusaders supposedly asked Arnaud whether they should spare the Catholics' lives and only kill the heretics. Caesarius explained that Arnaud feared that some of the heretics would escape by pretending to be Catholics; so he refused permission to spare anyone.

Answer: Louis XIV

According to Jacques-Antoine Dulaure's "History of Paris," a judge referred to the king and the state in Louis' presence. Louis told the judge "I am the state."

Answer: Dorothy Parker

When Parker was working for the "New Yorker" in the 1920s, she complained about the cramped working conditions. One day she failed to come in the work, and, when asked why, she explained that someone else was using the pencil.