19 Quotes by John Edensor Littlewood

The referee said it was not acceptable, but the Press considered they could not refuse to publish a book by a professor of the university.

The infinitely competent can be uncreative.

A heavy warning used to be given that pictures are not rigorous; this has never had its bluff called and has permanently frightened its victims into playing for safety.

In passing, I firmly believe that research should be offset by a certain amount of teaching, if only as a change from the agony of research. The trouble, however, I freely admit, is that in practice you get either no teaching, or else far too much.

A Miscellany is a collection without a natual ordering relation.

I’ve been giving this lecture to first-year classes for over twenty-five years. You’d think they would begin to understand it by now.

I recall once saying that when I had given the same lecture several times I couldn’t help feeling that they really ought to know it by now.

The first lecture of each new year renews for most people a light stage fright.

It is true that I should have been surprised in the past to learn that Professor Hardy had joined the Oxford Group. But one could not say the adverse chance was 1:10. Mathematics is a dangerous profession; an appreciable proportion of us go mad, and then this particular event would be quite likely.