Do you have any quotable last words for us?

Memorable quotations are useful in speeches. This year there was a book by Joseph Hayden titled Any last words?: Deathbed Quotes and Famous Farewells.

He says that Abraham Lincoln’s last words (before he was shot) were:

“She won’t think anything about it.”

That was in reply to his wife Mary Todd having asked him:

“What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?  

In chronological order (by date of death) ten others were:

Jane Austen (1775 – 1817): “I want nothing but death.”

Zachary Taylor (1784 – 1850) “I regret nothing, but I am sorry to leave my friends.”

Emily Dickinson (1830 – 1886): “I must go in, for the fog is rising.”

Tom ‘Black Jack’ Ketchum (1863 - 1901): “I’ll be in hell before you start breakfast. Let her rip!”

Douglas Fairbanks (1883 – 1939): “I’ve never felt better.”

Eugene O’Neill (1888 – 1953): “I knew it! I knew it! Born in a hotel room and, God damn it, died in a hotel room.”

Sam Cooke (1931 - 1964): “Lady, you shot me.”

Groucho Marx (1890 – 1977): “Die, my dear? Why, that’s the last thing I’ll do!”

Richard Feynman (1918 – 1988): “I’d hate to die twice. It’s so boring.”

Del Close (1934 – 1999): "I’m tired of being the funniest person in the room.”

At Mental Floss on July 4, 2013 you can find an article by Stacy Conradt listing The last words of 38 presidents. On October 27, 2011 I blogged about Any last words?

Tylor Ketchum and his band Tylor & the Train Robbers tell the story of his ancestor in the Ballad of Black Jack Ketchum which is a song on their second album, Best of the Worst Kind. There is a striking live solo version too.   

 

An image of Lincoln on his deathbed came from the Library of Congress.