# George  Bernard Shaw Quote?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/george-bernard-shaw-quote/55915>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 26, 2001, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/george-bernard-shaw-quote/55915 "2001-02-26T13:14:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![egkelly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/db5fbb/32.png) [@egkelly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/egkelly)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2001, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/george-bernard-shaw-quote/55915/1 "2001-02-26T13:14:22Z")

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Can someone of a literary bent help me? I am going crazy trying to find a quotation by G B Shaw-it’s about failure…some thing like " …a lifetime of failure is a far more honorable thing than a life without trying". I really want to find the context of this one! (So far my life is resembling continous failure!

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**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2001, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/george-bernard-shaw-quote/55915/2 "2001-02-26T13:25:49Z")

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I’m a big G.B. Shaw fan, but that one doesn’t ring a bell.

I think there’s a concordance in The Collected Work of George Bernard Shaw. You might try looking through that.

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**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2001, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/george-bernard-shaw-quote/55915/3 "2001-02-26T13:49:54Z")

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The following two sites refer to failure but not directly to the quote, though the works cited on Success and Failure may be useful:

[http://www.cyber-nation.com/victory/quotations/authors/quotes\_shaw\_georgebernard.html](http://www.cyber-nation.com/victory/quotations/authors/quotes_shaw_georgebernard.html)

[http://www.ag.wastholm.net/author/George\_Bernard\_Shaw](http://www.ag.wastholm.net/author/George_Bernard_Shaw)

The following site has the quotation that you seek but as link that is blind:

[http://www.geocities.com/gunjansaraf/shaw.htm](http://www.geocities.com/gunjansaraf/shaw.htm)

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.”

Also:

[http://www.cp-tel.net/miller/BilLee/quotes/Shaw.html](http://www.cp-tel.net/miller/BilLee/quotes/Shaw.html)

with no cite

[http://www.irishclans.com/articles/famirish/shawgb.html](http://www.irishclans.com/articles/famirish/shawgb.html)

ditto

However:

[http://www.bemorecreative.com/one/190.htm](http://www.bemorecreative.com/one/190.htm)

cites: In “The International Thesaurus of Quotations,” by Rhoda Thomas Tripp, 1995.  
I suspect that he may have said it in an interview rather than written it in a book or article as I cannot find a reference anywhere. You may need to try an Autobiography.

Sorry not to be able to give a cite, but at leat you have the correct quote.

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**Author:** ![Alonist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@Alonist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alonist)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2001, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/george-bernard-shaw-quote/55915/4 "2001-02-26T17:21:43Z")

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My motto is G.K. Chesterton’s: “Anything worth doing at all is worth doing badly.” That’s badly quoted. [The Quotemeister](http://www.chesterton.org/qmeister/doingbadly.htm) says it is “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”