Spike Milligan
Topics
Spike Milligan
Quotations
Terence Alan Milligan, KBE (16 April 1918 – 27 February 2002), known as Spike Milligan, was an Irish writer, artist, musician, humanitarian, comedian and poet. He played the piano, trumpet, saxophone, and guitar. While producing a prodigous number of books, he remains most famous as the creator, principal writer and performing member of The Goon Show.
Sourced
- For ten years Caesar ruled with an iron hand. Then with a wooden foot, and finally with a piece of string.
- The Goon Show, "The Histories of Pliny the Elder"
- Contraceptives should be used on every conceivable occasion.
- Policemen are numbered in case they get lost.
- I thought I'd begin by reading a poem by Shakespeare, but then I thought, why should I? He never reads any of mine.
- Spike Milligan with Jeremy Taylor Live at Cambridge University. Recorded at Cambridge University on December 2, 1973, this was previously released as a double LP, and later re-issued as a 2 CD set. Milligan used variations on the Shakespear line throughout his later life.
- If a man dies when you hang him, keep hanging him until he gets used to it.
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Unsourced
- Are you going to come along quietly, or am I going to have to use ear plugs?
- The Goon Show, Season 9, Episode 12: The Call of the West
- Alternative: "Are you going to come along quietly, or do you want musical accompaniment?"
- I told you I was ill!
- His epitaph. On his tombstone this is rendered in Irish: "Dúirt mé leat go raibh mé breoite."
- A sure cure for seasickness is to sit under a tree.
- Education isn't everything; for a start it isn't an elephant.
- I can't see the sense in it [his honorary CBE] really. It makes me a Commander of the British Empire. They might as well make me a Commander of Milton Keynes — at least that exists.
- How long was I in the army? Five foot eleven.
- My father had a profound influence on me, he was a lunatic.
-From Spike's collection of War Diaries
- The only nice thing I can wish him is an early death
- About British DJ and television presenter Chris Evans when Milligan appeared on Room 101
- World peace could be a possibility...if it weren't for all those damned foreigners!
- The boy stood on the burning deck, whence all but he had fled. Twit.
- Commentary on a poem
- I'm fucking Irish!
- When a fan asked him for the autograph of the funniest Englishman ever.
- Is there anything worn under the kilt? No, it's all in perfect working order.
- Commentary on Scotland
On life and death
- When I look back, the fondest memory I have is not really of the Goons. It is of a girl called Julia with enormous breasts.
- Money can't buy you happiness but it does bring you a more pleasant form of misery.
- Money can't buy you friends, but you do get a better class of enemy.
- All I ask is the chance to prove that money can't make me happy.
- I hope you go before me because I don't want you singing at my funeral.
- In a fax to Harry Secombe. Harry did go before Spike, but Harry Secombe sang at Spike's funeral from a recording.
On royalty
- Oh, the little grovelling bastard.
- Response at the British Comedy Awards in 1994 after the reading of a letter from Prince Charles congratulating him on his Lifetime Achievement Award
- I suppose a knighthood is out of the question then?
- Fax to Prince Charles shortly afterwards
- I can't see the sense in it really. It makes me a Commander of the British Empire. They might as well make me a Commander of Milton Keynes - at least that exists.
- Upon receiving his CBE
- Said Prince Charles when they placed the crown on his head: I suppose this means that Mummy's dead.
Other quotes
- We're Rat-Rat-Rat-Rat-Rat-Rat-Ratties!
- There's no such thing as anything, and sometimes even less!
- The small of my back is too big
- My ribs give me claustrophobia
- I don't like jam, I don't want it to know where I am
- Are you going to come along quietly, or am I going to have to use ear plugs?
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