Catch-phrases are included if there is evidence that they are widely remembered or used. However, we have generally omitted phrases like “agonizing reappraisal” which are covered adequately in the Oxford English Dictionary.
These are usually included if they can be traced to a particular originator. For example, some quotations (like “The opera ain’t over till the fat lady sings”) become proverbial. It is difficult to draw the line between quotations and similar sayings like proverbs, catch-phrases, and idioms. The quotations are drawn from novels, plays, poems, essays, speeches, films radio and television broadcasts, songs, advertisements, and even book titles. The book can be used for reference or for browsing: to trace the source of a particular quotation or to find an appropriate saying for a special need. Popularity and familiarity are the main criteria for inclusion, although no reader is likely to be familiar with all the quotations in this dictionary. As a result, this book is not-like many quotations dictionaries-a subjective anthology of the editor’s favourite quotations, but an objective selection of the quotations which are most widely known and used.
For example, our collections contained more than thirty examples each for Edward Heath’s “unacceptable face of capitalism” and Marshal McLuhan’s “The medium is the message,” so both these quotations had to be included. The dictionary includes the commonest quotations which were found in a collection of more than 200,000 citations assembled by combing books, magazines, and newspapers. This dictionary has been compiled from extensive evidence of the quotations that are actually used in this way. Often they will quote it directly, introducing it with a phrase like “As-says” but equally often they will assume that the reader or listener already knows the quotation, and they will simply allude to it without mentioning its source (as in the headline “A rosè is a rosè is a rosè,” referring obliquely to a line by Gertrude Stein). Preface What is a “quotation”? It is a saying or piece of writing that strikes people as so true or memorable that they quote it (or allude to it) in speech or writing.
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