Sunday, November 21, 2010

I dream things that never were and say - Why not?


Serpent : “You see things; and you say Why? But I dream things that never were; and I say Why not?”
  
From Shaw’s play, Back to Methuselah, Act I. The serpent addresses these words to Eve.  John F Kennedy adapted the quote and made it famous in this form:-

Some men see things as they are and say, why?  I dream things that never were and say, why not?

He used it for the first time when he addressed the Dáil on June 28, 1963. His brother Robert used the quote continually during his 1968 campaign for president.  A few weeks ago a reader wrote to the Irish Examiner to say he was with senator Robert Kennedy when he used the quote five days prior to his assassination in Central Valley, California, in May of that year.  Ted Kennedy used it at his brother Robert’s funeral, 8 June 1968. 

I must read Back to Methuselah!  I may get inspiration for my Adam and Eve story.
 

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