Never, never, never, on cross-examination ask a witness
a question you don’t already know the answer to.
The words come from Jean Louise “Scout” Finch, the narrator of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird and the daughter of a small-town southern lawyer named Atticus Finch. The role of Finch was played by Gregory Peck in the film, for which he won an Oscar for Best Actor. After adding that this legal maxim “was a tenet I absorbed with my babyfood,” Scout warned, “Do it, and you’ll often get an answer you don’t want, an answer that might wreck your case.”
Later in the chapter, you’ll find a few more triples, but they are far exceeded by the number of double neverisms. They come from every sector of life:
Never, ever backstab.RICHARD CARlSON, in his 1998 book
Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff at Work
Unless you are disabled,
never, ever park in a handicapped parking spot.P. M. FORNI, in The Civility Solution (2008)
Never, ever give up on sex.DR. RUTH WESTHEIMER
In most double neverisms, the words are repeated at the beginning of the observation. But in some cases, you’ll see the word appear at both the beginning and—emphatically—at the very end of the admonition, as in Never drink and drive. Never! H. L. Mencken chose this approach in a 1948 interview in which he said he never had any problems with alcohol because, early in life, he had formulated three rules that were “simple as mud.” The first one was:
Never drink if you’ve got any work to do. Never.
Mencken then laid out the other two rules in the traditional manner (the italics are mine): “Secondly, never drink alone. That’s the way to become a drunkard. And thirdly, even if you haven’t got any work to do, never drink while the sun is shining. Wait until it’s dark. By that time you’re near enough to bed to recover quickly.”
Winston Churchill also used a before-and-after approach in the concluding line of an oft-quoted observation about facing danger:
One ought never to turn one’s back on a threatened danger
and try to run away from it.
If you do that, you will double the danger.
But if you meet it promptly and without flinching,
you will reduce the danger by half.
Never run away from anything. Never!
With some multiple neverisms, the key words appear at the conclusion of a longer passage. In a 1961 Sunday Times piece titled “Consider the Public,” Noël Coward warned “New Movement” playwrights about the danger of letting their political views or sense of morality take precedence over their artistic talent. Suggesting that the theater is primarily a place for entertainment, he wrote:
Consider the public. Treat it with tact and courtesy.
It will accept much from you if you are clever enough to win it to your side.
Never fear or despise it.
Coax it, charm it, interest it, stimulate it,
shock it now and then if you must,
make it laugh, make it cry, and make it think, but above all . . .
never, never, never bore the living hell out of it.
In the rest of the chapter, you’ll find nothing but multiple neverisms. They come from all kinds of people and from every sector of life. And they’ve all been offered by people hoping their words will never, ever be misunderstood.
Never, ever leave a hickey.
That little trick grew really old after junior high school.DAN ANDERSON & MAGGIE BERMAN, in their 1997
bestseller Sex Tips for Straight Women from a Gay Man
Never, never let a person know you’re frightened.
And a group of them . . . absolutely never.
Fear brings out the worst in everybody.MAYA ANGELOU, quoting her mother,
in The Heart of a Woman (1977)
Never, absolutely never, compromise your principles.MARY KAY ASH in The Mary Kay Way (2008)
Never, never, never trust your memory with “word of mouth” information.
Write it down immediately and date it.CHARLES L. BLOCKSON, in his 1977 book Black Genealogy
Never, ever, say anything “off the record”
if you don’t want to see it in print.ILONA M. BRAY
Never, never try to be funny!MEL BROOKS, in a 1966 Playboy interview
Brooks explained: “The actors must be serious. Only the situation must be absurd. Funny is in the writing, not in the performing.” Earlier in his career, as The 2,000-Year-Old Man, Brooks offered a neveristic secret to longevity: “Never, ever touch fried food.”
Never be the first to arrive at a party or the last to go home,
and never, ever be both.DAVID BROWN
This appeared in a 2001 Esquire article titled “What I’ve Learned,” in which Brown, then eighty-four, reflected on the many lessons he had learned in his full life and celebrated career. Brown, the longtime husband of Helen Gurley Brown and producer of such classic Hollywood films as The Sting, Jaws, and Driving Miss Daisy, also offered one additional neverism, undoubtedly stimulated by the classic Nelson Algren admonition featured earlier. Brown said, “Never sleep with anyone who has more trouble or less money than you have.”
Never, ever forget that people’s selfish interest comes first,
and that includes you and me.HELEN GURLEY BROWN
This appeared in a 1994 column in Cosmopolitan magazine. Brown added:Doing what we feel we have to do for ourselves—even if inconvenient to others—is how we stay alive and occasionally get something we want. Underneath—possibly way underneath baffling behavior—is the likelihood the behavior is answering somebody’s (dumb or reasonable) need.
Never, ever underestimate your readers.
Everything you do registers.RITA MAE BROWN, in Starting from Scratch (1988)
Never, never listen to anybody who tries to discourage you.MARIAH CAREY
Never, ever, threaten unless you’re going to follow through,
because if you don’t, the next time you won’t be taken seriously.ROY M. COHN
Never, never get involved with someone who wants to change you.QUENTIN CRISP & DONALD CARROLL
In their 1981 book Doing It with Style, Crisp and Carroll explained themselves this way: “If you have any style, any change can only be for the worse.”
Never, Never, Never take No-Doz
and drink Jolt or Mellow Yellow together.