# Famous First Words **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [February 1, 2000, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588 "2000-02-01T08:14:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/41 "2000-02-01T21:36:00Z")
Mr. TS: Is “Call me Jonah” from Vonnegut’s CAT’S CRADLE? AW: Very impressive! Try this one, from one of the great crime short stories of all time (which is NOT to say it isn’t obscure): U-3) “At six o’clock of a January evening Mr. Whybrow was walking home through the cobweb alleys of London’s East End. He had left the golden clamour of the great High Street to which the tram had brought him from the river and his daily work, and was now in the chess-board of byways that is called Mallon End.” * * * Uke ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/42 "2000-02-01T21:38:00Z")
Logjam cleared, I see. Sorry for the multiple. All THREE submits went through at once. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Thin\_Skin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d78d45/32.png) [@Mr\_Thin\_Skin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Thin_Skin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/43 "2000-02-01T21:43:00Z")
Yes it was _Cat’s Cradle_. After it was mentioned earlier, I thought others would check out the book and get the too-short quote immediately. Strange collection of simu/multi posts I must say. Skoal, D.S. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/44 "2000-02-01T21:45:00Z")
Pixoid: Nice going. And yup, he’s one of my favorites. Chaim Mattis Keller ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/45 "2000-02-01T22:17:00Z")
TomH: Correct on _Wuthering Heights_ Arnold W.: Correct on _Canticle_ and _The Once and Future King_ But you’re both wrong about the Mason City one… * * * I think apathy, depression, irony, and confusion are damned fine ways to view a world going to hell. – Cynthia Heimel ---
**Author:** ![Sylence](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b19c9b/32.png) [@Sylence](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sylence)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/46 "2000-02-01T22:58:00Z")
Madpoet wrote: > [@](#): > > “It’s a sin to write this.” Is that from _Anthem_ by Ayn Rand? I don’t know any of the others that haven’t been answered already, so I’ll add a few of my own: S-1) “Where’s Papa going with that ax?” said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast. S-2) He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. S-3) The boy with the fair hair lowered himself down the last few feet of rock and began to pick his way toward the lagoon. S-4) Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. S-5) No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man’s and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. S-6) It was love at first sight. – Sylence * * * If a bird doesn’t sing, I’ll wait until it sings. - Tokugawa Ieyasu ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/47 "2000-02-01T23:07:00Z")
S-1 is Charlotte’s Web, and S-2 is The Old Man and the Sea. The rest I don’t know. Chaim Mattis Keller ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/48 "2000-02-01T23:08:00Z")
S-1) “Where’s Papa going with that ax?” said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast. E.B. White; CHARLOTTE’S WEB ``` S-2) He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. ``` Ernest Hemingway; THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA ``` S-3) The boy with the fair hair lowered himself down the last few feet of rock and began to pick his way toward the lagoon. ``` William Golding; LORD OF THE FLIES ``` S-4) Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. ``` Yipe. You got me there. ``` S-5) No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. ``` H.G. Wells’ WAR OF THE WORLDS ``` S-6) It was love at first sight. ``` ## Joseph Heller; CATCH-22 Uke ---
**Author:** ![TripleAnt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e19adc/32.png) [@TripleAnt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TripleAnt)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/49 "2000-02-01T23:25:00Z")
How about this one… …Minus 100 and Counting… She was squinting at the thermometer in the white light coming through the window. Beyond her, in the drizzle, the other highrises in Co-Op city rose like the gray turrets of a penitentiary. * * * “The idea of a walk-in closet sounds frightening. If I’m ever sittin’ at home and a closet walks in, I’m gettin’ outta there.” ~George Carlin ---
**Author:** ![Yue\_Han](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/eada6e/32.png) [@Yue\_Han](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yue_Han)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/50 "2000-02-01T23:28:00Z")
> [@](#): > > (S-4) Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. C. S. Lewis, \* the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. \* YH1) It was a pleasure to burn. YH2) The drought had lasted now for 10 million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had long since ended. YH3) This time there would be no witnesses. (HINT: the title appears somewhere in this thread.) –John ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/51 "2000-02-01T23:36:00Z")
NUTS! I had a feeling that might have been it, but didn’t want to screw up my 5-for-5… YH1) Bradbury; FAHRENHEIT 451 ? ---
**Author:** ![Yue\_Han](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/eada6e/32.png) [@Yue\_Han](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yue_Han)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/52 "2000-02-01T23:47:00Z")
You got it, Ike. –John ---
**Author:** ![Absynthetic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/97f17d/32.png) [@Absynthetic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Absynthetic)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/53 "2000-02-01T23:48:00Z")
A1) There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. And do plays count? Although this one is a dead give-away. A2) Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. ---
**Author:** ![Globe-trotter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/cab0a1/32.png) [@Globe-trotter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Globe-trotter)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/54 "2000-02-01T23:56:00Z")
\*\*A1) There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë A2) Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. Romeo and Juliet * * * Eat right, exercise daily, live clean, die anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/55 "2000-02-02T00:31:00Z")
OK, Uke, I give on our friend Mr. Whybrow. I know it’s not a Sherlock Holmes story, but beyond that, I’m clueless. ---
**Author:** ![Globe-trotter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/cab0a1/32.png) [@Globe-trotter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Globe-trotter)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/56 "2000-02-02T00:38:00Z")
MG1) Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. MG2) Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. MG3) In the late summer of that year we lived in a house in a village that looked across the river and the plain to the mountains. MG4) The family of Dashwood had long been settled in Sussex. ---
**Author:** ![MadPoet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8c91f0/32.png) [@MadPoet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MadPoet)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/57 "2000-02-02T00:49:00Z")
Sylence got my first one… strange no one got my second, guess there must be fewer geeks on here than I thought. * * * [http://www.madpoet.com](http://www.madpoet.com) I’ve got a little black book with me poems in. I’ve got a bag, toothbrush, and a comb. ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/58 "2000-02-02T01:38:00Z")
> [@](#): > > MG4) The family of Dashwood had long been settled in Sussex. _Sense and Sensibility_. Also, I know I have read the one about happy and unhappy families, but I can’t remember where. ::pout:: Several of my favorite books have already been done. Pop quiz on the first line from _Catch-22_: who was Yossarian in love with from first sight? No looking! * * * ~Harborina ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/59 "2000-02-02T02:13:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by MadPoet: > **"The sky above the port was the color of a television, tuned to a dead channel."** Neuromancer, William Gibson. Y’all need a hint on the ‘Summer of the Late Rose’ one? * * * _Eschew Obfuscation_ ---
**Author:** ![G.B.H.Hornswoggler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c67d28/32.png) [@G.B.H.Hornswoggler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/G.B.H.Hornswoggler)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2000, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588/60 "2000-02-02T02:36:00Z")
MoosieGirl: > [@](#): > > MG1) Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. _Anna Karenina_ by Tolstoi (don’t trust my spelling, though) > [@](#): > > MG2) Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. _David Copperfield_ by Dickens (ooh, or is it _Great Expectations_? I could check, but that would be cheating…) I’ll have a few of my own soon, but I want to see if I can get in with these guesses first! * * * …but when you get blue, and you’ve lost all your dreams, there’s nothing like a campfire and a can of beans! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-first-words/13588.md?page=4)