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QUESTION: Orwell and Bradbury Quotations

Submitted by Martin on Wed, 09/17/2008 - 3:36pm
question / pregunta: 

I am looking for the sources for two highly quoted but (as far as I can tell) never cited quotations. I prefer to have the original source - that could be journal article, newspaper article, interview, authored work, etc. but I can accept a reference to a reputable quotations dictionary or other reference work. I need page number in addition to the title, publisher, etc.

The first quote is:

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
~Ray Bradbury

The second quote is:
If large numbers of people believe in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech even if the law forbids it. But if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them.

~George Orwell

Answers

Answer posted by: jbeek

The Orwell quote is genuine, and can be found in Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell, on page 40, in an essay called "Freedom of the Park," which appeared in the Tribune on Dec. 7, 1945.

I found this using the Google books technique demonstrated by a cohort on the Castro quote. Using this technique for the Bradbury quote turned up no cited references, so it may be apocryphal. Stay tuned...

Answer posted by: jenna

I found a verification of the Bradbury quote, in the 15th book of quotations I looked through!

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them." Ray Bradbury, Reader's Digest, 1994

Found in The Times Book of Quotations. 2000. [Glasgow]: Times Books. p. 93

Reader's Digest! Which I don't have easy access to. Maybe you do, Martin?
#1Submitted by Martin on Mon, 09/22/2008 - 5:21pm.

Thanks jbeek

Thanks for the Orwell source. I found it in our library here.

#2Submitted by Martin on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 11:27am.

Thanks jenna

I will look for the Reader's Digest, but the citation from the quotes book will do if I can't get the RD. Thanks so much for your efforts.

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