Do You Have a Question About a Quotation?
The Quote Investigator® Has Answers!
The internet is filled with misquotations, misattributions, and inaccurate citations. Popular websites like goodreads and brainyquote are packed with misinformation, and it is extremely easy to be misled.
When someone with a modicum of fame uses a sloppy misquotation in a speech, essay, or tweet it often generates responses. Some replies present constructive help while others offer ridicule. A reduction in credibility is inevitable.
The Quote Investigator (QI) has been answering questions about quotations for more than a decade. There were more than 4.2 million visitors to the website between June 1, 2021 and May 31, 2022 according to Google Analytics. More than two thousand quotations have been carefully examined. The number of words on the website exceeds 2.3 million.
Many news organizations have used information from the Quote Investigator website including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Economist, NPR, and The Washington Post.
QI greatly enjoys receiving requests from visitors, and he has been able to help numerous people. However, QI is unable to research all queries because there are far too many, and a single quotation may require hours of research time. QI maintains more than three thousand open files representing partial investigations many of which are ongoing. New requests arrive every day. Do not be discouraged because often a request will jump to the top of the queue.
To contact the Quote Investigator (Garson O’Toole) please send an email message; please delete the spaces in this name “garson o toole” and use the gmail domain.
Tip: Wikiquote was created by volunteer editors using the same crowdsource strategy as Wikipedia. It is a valuable resource worth consulting, but it does occasionally contain errors. Try to double-check the information. If the quote you are looking for is not on the “Main” page then examine the “Talk” page to see if the quote has been mentioned in this discussion section. This may give you some insight into the current status of the quotation.
