Churchill by Himself: The Definitive Collection of Quotations

by Richard M. Langworth

“Never give in!” Winston Churchill is famous for admonishing: “This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never.” What most people don’t know is that when he said this he was addressing not a nation facing the threat of invasion, but a roomful of schoolboys at his old school. A powerful, persuasive speaker and notorious wit, Churchill is one of the twentieth century’s most oft-quoted leaders—and one frequently misquoted or quoted out of context. Yet his actual remarks were often much wiser and wittier than reported. Churchill By Himself is the first exhaustive, attributed, and annotated collection of Churchill sayings. Edited by a longtime Churchill scholar and authorized by the Churchill estate, the quotations provide the first wholly accurate record of the esteemed statesman’s words.

Genres: History, Biography, Nonfiction, World War II, Reference, Politics, Biography Memoir

627 pages, Hardcover

First published September 4, 2008

About the author

Richard M. Langworth was an American author who was based in Moultonborough, New Hampshire, United States, and Eleuthera, Bahamas, who specialised in automotive history and Winston Churchill. He was editor of The Packard Cormorant from 1975 to 2001 and was a Trustee of the Packard Motorcar Foundation in Detroit, Michigan. His works have won awards from the Antique Automobile Club of America, Society of Automotive Historians, Old Cars Weekly, Packard Club and Graphic Arts Association of New Hampshire.
Langworth was also author or editor of A Connoisseur's Guide to the Books of Sir Winston Churchill, Churchill in His Own Words, Churchill By Himself, and nine other books about Churchill. Langworth founded the Churchill Study Unit (1968) and served as the president of its successors the International Churchill Society and the Churchill Centre (1988–1999) and chairman of its board of trustees (2000–2006). He was editor of the Churchill journal "Finest Hour" from 1982 to 2014 and editorial consultant to the National Churchill Museum (2011–2015). From 2014 to 2025, he was a Senior Fellow for the Churchill Project at Hillsdale College. In 1998, he was created a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) by Elizabeth II for his services to Anglo-American understanding and history.

Reviews

[david · Rating 3 out of 5]

Genius.

[Martyn Lovell · Rating 3 out of 5]

This work is a 600 page collection of Churchill quotes, each carefully sourced, indexed and contextualised. Churchill was a perceptive, witty and incisive person - so the individual quotes make good reading.

The author also does a good job of listing falsely attributed quotes and finding the actual source, and of categorizing the quotes usefully so that it is easy to find something on point.

If you are a serious Churchill enthusiast, it might be possible to read this from start to finish and enjoy that. However, for me, reading 600 pages of quotes at once was way too dry and scattered. If I want to know what Churchill said on a subject, I would look to this book, but I don't think I would enjoy ploughing through it sequentially.

Recommended as a reference, but not as a read.

[Conrad Wesselhoeft · Rating 5 out of 5]

Winston Churchill not only made history, he wrote about it with color, force, and wit. For years, I've been savoring this book in morsels and heaps. I look forward to many more trips to the Churchillian smorgasbord.

[Becky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Winston Churchill has 15 million published words. This 656 page book represents about 0.2 percent of them. He was the right man at the right time who stepped up to the challenge and helped rescue the whole world from Hitler. How different our lives would have been had he not done his part to hold Germany at bay until the U.S. joined the war. He was a terrific wordsmith, i enjoyed his masterful use of language.

[Ron Crooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

A man of great wit.

[Suvidutt Sundaram · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best comprehensive work on Churchill for the so-called Churchill aficionados.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved reading the history behind many of the quotations! Most I'd never heard; others have become part of our daily language.

[Terry Feix · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitive collection.

[AnnieM · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knocked a start off because of the organization of the book makes specific quotes hard or almost impossible to find. I do love it because it seems the most include book I’ve seen so far.