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The Unspoken Mark Twain

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From: The Washington Post
Date: 19910815
Author:

Scholars can't be certain Mark Twain said, "Better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt."

But they're agreed the phrase bears the hallmarks of the author-wit-raconteur.

Scholars of the Mark Twain Papers at the University of California have for years been hunting for the sources of quips credited to Twain. So far, they have only come up with a long list of what Twain might not have said.

They include:

- "The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco."

- "When I feel the urge to exercise, I lie down until it passes away."

...

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