Mark Twain on Play vs. Work

What work I have done I have done because it has been play. If it had been work I shouldn't have done it.

Who was it who said, "Blessed is the man who has found his work"? Whoever it was he had the right idea in his mind. Mark you, he says his work--not somebody else's work. The work that is really a man's own work is play and not work at all. Cursed is the man who has found some other man's work and cannot lose it. When we talk about the great workers of the world we really mean the great players of the world. The fellows who groan and sweat under the weary load of toil that they bear never can hope to do anything great. How can they when their souls are in a ferment of revolt against the employment of their hands and brains? The product of slavery, intellectual or physical, can never be great.

-- "A Humorist's Confession," The New York Times, November 26, 1905

I was checking the veracity of a story a friend had forwarded to me when I found www.snopes.com on Google. Snopes is a site that provides the facts behind urban myths, both current stories and legends that have been around a while. (Did you know that Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer was created in 1939 by a Montgomery Ward employee as a story book to give to customers as a promotional gimmick? The song was subsequently written by his brother-in-law and recorded in 1947 by Gene Autry, becoming the second most popular Christmas recording ever, following "White Christmas" by Bing Crosby.)

I had fun romping through Snopes' various categories. I stumbled onto the fact that many quotes and stories have been erroneously attributed to both Albert Einstein and Mark Twain -- the former lends credulity to a story, the latter lends an predisposition to the listener finding a quote or comment humorous. Interesting.

You can relax; the above quote is legit.