Quote

The audiences like to think that satire is doing something. But, in fact, it is mostly to leave themselves satisfied. Satisfied rather than angry, which is what they should be.

Tom Lehrer

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Tom Lehrer
Age: 96
Born: 1928
Born: April 9
Lyricist
Mathematician
Pianist
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
University Teacher
New York City
New York
Thomas Andrew Lehrer
Thomas Lehrer
Something
Mostly
Think
Satisfied
Thinking
Angry
Like
Leave
Audience
Rather
Fact
Satire
Facts
Audiences

More quotes by Tom Lehrer

Image
I went from adolescence to senility, trying to bypass maturity.
Tom Lehrer
Image
When correctly viewed, everything is lewd.
Tom Lehrer
Image
You can make fun with Saddam Hussein jokes ... but you can't make fun of, say, the concentration camps. I think my target was not so much evil, but benign stupidity people doing stupid things without realising or, instead, thinking they were doing good.
Tom Lehrer
Image
I ache for the touch of your lips dear, but much more for the touch of your whips dear.
Tom Lehrer
Image
If I can't get people to commit themselves on whether or not there is a square root of two, then I won't touch on God or anything here
Tom Lehrer
Image
When you attend a funeral, It is sad to think that sooner o' Later those you love will do the same for you. And you may have thought it tragic, Not to mention other adjec- Tives, to think of all the weeping they will do. (But don't you worry.
Tom Lehrer
Image
Don't write naughty words on the wall if you can't spell!
Tom Lehrer
Image
I feel that if a person has problems communicating the very least he can do is to shut up.
Tom Lehrer
Image
They love us everywhere we go. So when in doubt, send the Marines.
Tom Lehrer
Image
Alas, irreverence has been subsumed by mere grossness, at least in the so-called mass media. What we have now - to quote myself at my most pretentious - is a nimiety of scurrility with a concomitant exiguity of taste.
Tom Lehrer
Image
It is a sobering thought that when Mozart was my age, he had been dead for two years.
Tom Lehrer
Image
From the three, you then use one to make eight ones. You add those ones to the three, and you get one-three base eight, or, in other words, In base ten you have eleven, and you take away seven. And seven from eleven is four. Now go back to the sixty-fours, you're left with two.
Tom Lehrer
Image
And although I'm all for freedom of expression and against censorship, there are certain things I'm not willing to go to jail for.
Tom Lehrer
Image
If, after hearing my songs, just one human being is inspired to say something nasty to a friend, or perhaps to strike a loved one, it will all have been worth the while.
Tom Lehrer
Image
Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down ? That's not my department.
Tom Lehrer
Image
Don't drink the water and don't breathe the air!
Tom Lehrer
Image
Oh, the Protestants hate the Catholics/ And the Catholics hate the Protestants/ And the Hindus hate the Muslims/ And everybody hates the Jews.
Tom Lehrer
Image
Filth, I'm glad to say, is in the mind of the beholder. When correctly viewed, everything is lewd.
Tom Lehrer
Image
The audience usually has to be with you, I'm afraid. I always regarded myself as not even preaching to the converted, I was titillating the converted.
Tom Lehrer
Image
I'm very proud of myself on my, whatever the literacy is, I'm pretentious, totally pretentious. I like to say 'hmm', for example.
Tom Lehrer