„Die Ewigkeit dauert lange und ein Ende ist noch nicht in Sicht." :)

So far, all I've found is physicists such as Hawking and Martin Rees quoting Allen.

Still searching for the source. It doesn't seem to be at 145Gev.

Well, I solemnly avow that I heard Woody Allen say these words, or something very close to them, in one of his movies.  I just don't remember which one.  There are so many; and they are all somewhat similar, aren't they?  And Allen plays the same character in all of them.  That's not to say that they're not entertaining, of course.  I suppose I best liked Hannah and Her Sisters.

Anyway it may also have been said in his book Side Effects, but if so it's something that he chose to say also in that movie that I saw.

Concerning possibility that this was said by Kafka, we should recognize that he might have spoken these words in a casual conversation that somebody remembered and reported in, say, a magazine article.  Or he might have put it in a letter.  So just because it doesn't appear in one of his works doesn't necessarily mean that he's not responsible for it.  But for sure it will be impossible to prove that person X didn't say it.  That's why the burden of proof must be upon those who would claim that person X did say it.

Hell, maybe Napoleon said it during his last days on St. Helena.

While it's always possible for a quote to have occurred centuries earlier, our fascination with eternity (and infinity) really took off with Cantor's heirarchy of infinities. This was in the 19th Century, so I would expect the quote to be from no earlier than, say, ~1850.

That of course still leaves Kafka in the running, but casts doubt on the possibility of Talleyrand saying it. I have no clue who Beauvais was. I don't think it really sounds much like Kafka either. I'd be more inclined to believe Borges said it, but without a reference to the quote, we're left with Allen ... for now.

Regarding the fact that amazon.com's "look inside" doesn't have the quote, that would only be meaningful if amazon.com had the entire text up for preview. Which it doesn't.

MNb wrote on 08/23/11 at 13:09:38:

According to Amazon's look inside feature, the word "eternity" doesn't appear once.

Stefan seems to be right, according to http://www.cisco.com/web/about/ac123/ac147/archived_issues/ipj_11-4/114_eternity...

Though I wouldn't be surprised if there's an earlier record of somebody saying something similar or about something else but with the same ending, Woody Allen is rather typical of the Jewish humour tradition.


Quote:


Quote:


from: http://www.courtois.cc/citations/temps.html


One way to find the original source could be to search for the quote in books.google.com , but finding a book that actually gives a source won't be easy - if anyone has the time...

Djy wrote on 08/22/11 at 12:35:58:

Can you cite any of these experts?

Fwiw, I did find a French website listing Kafka quotations, and including this one. But no citations were given and, for that matter, who knows how authoritative a website is?  IF Kafka said this, there must be an attribution somewhere. Somehow, somewhere, someone heard Kafka say this and reported it. So how, where and who?

On the other hand, it is known to have been said by Woody Allen. So the burden of proof does seem to rest with those who say Kafka.

My other problem with the Kafka attribution is that this zingy one-liner is completly characteristic of Woody Allen, not at all of Kafka (at least according to my sensibility).