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The best Chiasmus and most famous Spoonerisms of All Time

compiled and edited by Michael R. Burch

Related pages: Best Political Epigrams, Best Epigrams about Sex and Marriage, Best Humorous Epigrams, Best One-Liners and Zingers

This page contains some of the greatest chiasmus and spoonerisms of all time. (I simply refuse to use the awkward plural form "chiasmi.") Before I attempt definitions, please allow me to offer a few stellar examples of the chiasmus:

It's not the size of the dog in the fight that counts, it's the size of the fight in the dog.—Dwight D. Eisenhower
It's not the men in your life that count, it's the life in your men.—Mae West
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.—Oscar Wilde
Men always want to be a woman's first love; women like to be a man's last romance.—Oscar Wilde
If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do, you are misinformed.—Mark Twain
It's not the parts of the Bible that I don't understand that bother me, it's the parts I do understand.—Mark Twain
Foreign aid is taking money from the poor people of a rich country and giving it to the rich people of a poor country.—Ron Paul

Definition: a chiasmus is a parallel grammatical construction in which the repeated words are re-ordered or otherwise altered in order to make a point. Mathematically and logically, instead of B=A, we end up with B ~ A (with a twist):

[A] I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do; [B] I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.—Ronald Reagan

A spoonerism is an aural chiasmus; the sounds are repeated and re-ordered, creating a pun. Here's my favorite spoonerism of all time:

I'd rather have a bottle in front of me
than a frontal lobotomy.
—Dorothy Parker

The spoonerism is named after William Archibald Spooner (1844-1930), an Oxford don, educator and clergyman. Spooner was described as "an albino, small, with a pink face, poor eyesight, and a head too large for his body." He was said to have been "a genial, kindly, hospitable man." But it seems he may have been a dyslexic of sorts who sometimes mixed up words unintentionally, saying for instance: "Kinkering Congs Their Titles Take" in a 1930 interview. Not altogether happy about being know for such malaprops, Spooner once denounced a crowd that had gathered to hear him speak by saying, "You haven't come for my lecture, you just want to hear one of those...things." Fortunately for us, poets like Dorothy Parker soon turned the spoonerism into a art form while famous athletes and coaches like Yogi Berra and Casey Stengel made them seem like a form of esoteric wisdom rather than unintentional comedy.

Both the chiasmus and the spoonerism are forms of the epigram (a brief saying that is generally pithy, clever, startling or amusing). Popular forms of the epigram include the epithet (a characterization of a person or thing, often insulting) and the epitaph (originally a gravestone inscription). Sometimes the lines blur. Here's an epitaph that is also a chiasmus, from the headstone of the famous boxer Jack Dempsey:

A gentle man and a gentleman.—Unknown

American presidents and other world leaders have been masters of the chiasmus:

We don't have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven't taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much.—Ronald Reagan
The difference between them and us is that we want to check government spending and they want to spend government checks.—Ronald Reagan
If you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.—Margaret Thatcher
Mankind must put an end to war, or war will put an end to mankind.—John F. Kennedy, Jr.

The history of such epigrams goes "way back" in time. In the 6th century B.C. the legendarily rich King Croesus of Lydia said:

In peace sons bury their fathers, but in war fathers bury their sons.—Croesus

Paradoxical, indeed! But some epigrams are so paradoxical they seem to be best taken for purposes of amusement and bemusement only:

I didn't really say all the things I said.—Yogi Berra

The Oscar Goes to Wilde: Chiastic Epigrams by the Divine Oscar Wilde

The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.
Life imitates art far more than art imitates life.
Woman begins by resisting a man's advances and ends by blocking his retreat.
A man's face is his autobiography. A woman's face is her work of fiction.
Men always want to be a woman's first love; women like to be a man's last romance.
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.
Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same.

The Twain Well Met: Chiastic Epigrams by Mark Twain

It's not the parts of the Bible that I don't understand that bother me, it's the parts I do understand.
If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do, you are misinformed.
It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog.
It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.

The Elegant Epigrams and Side-Splitting Spoonerisms of Dorothy Parker

I'd rather have a bottle in front of me
than a frontal lobotomy.

Men seldom make passes
At girls who wear glasses.

If, with the literate, I am
Impelled to try an epigram,
I never seek to take the credit;
We all assume that Oscar said it.

The Wit and Wisdom of Ronald Wilson Reagan

I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.
We don't have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven't taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much.
The difference between them and us is that we want to check government spending and they want to spend government checks.

Humor Equals Wit Times Genius Squared: The Epigrams of Albert Einstein

Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind.

Epigrams Reign: Michel de Montaigne

The only thing certain is that nothing is certain.
The thing I fear most is fear.
It is not death, it is dying that alarms me.
I speak others' minds only to speak my own the more.
He who would teach men to die would teach them to live.

Women and We Men (Wee Men?)

A man's got to do what a man's got to do. A woman must do what he can't.—Rhonda Hansome
I am a marvelous housekeeper. Every time I leave a man, I keep his house.—Zsa Zsa Gabor
If you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.—Margaret Thatcher
I'm not offended by dumb blonde jokes because I'm not dumb, and I'm also not blonde.—Dolly Parton

Where there's a Will there's a Way: the Epigrams of Will Rogers

It isn't what we don't know that gives us trouble, it's what we know that ain't so.
Things ain't what they used to be and never was.

Woody Allen

Most of the time I don't have much fun. The rest of the time I don't have any fun at all.
The lion and the lamb shall lie down together but the lamb won't get much sleep.
It's not that I'm afraid to die, I just don't want to be there when it happens.

Jonathan Swift

Every man desires to live long, but no man wishes to be old.
We have enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another.

Martial Law: the Epigrams of Marcus Valerius Martial

There is no living with thee, nor without thee.

Douglas Adams

Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.
You live and learn. Or at any rate, you live.

Nota Bene: the Notable Epigrams of Ben Franklin

We must indeed all hang together, or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.

Miscellanea

Quoting one is plagiarism; quoting many is research.—Unknown
Success comes in cans, not can't s.—Unknown
Art is long, life is short.—Goethe
To the living we owe respect but to the dead we owe only the truth.—Voltaire

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