QuotesCosmos
George Bernard Shaw, Back to Methuselah, act I, in Selected Plays with Prefaces (1949), vol. 2, p. 7. The serpent says these words to Eve. John F. Kennedy quoted this line in his address to the Irish Parliament, Dublin (June 28, 1963); Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963, p. 537. Robert F. Kennedy used a similar quotation as a theme of his 1968 campaign for the presidential nomination: "Some men see things as they are and say, why; I dream things that never were and say, why not." Ted Kennedy quoted this variation in delivering Robert F. Kennedy's eulogy in 1968; reported in The New York Times (June 9, 1968), p. 56.
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You see things; and you say "Why?" But I dream things that never were; and I say "Why not?"

— George Bernard Shaw on Dreams

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "You see things; and you say "Why?" But I dream things that never were; and I say "Why not?"" in the context of "George Bernard Shaw, Back to Methuselah, act I, in Selected Plays with Prefaces (1949), vol. 2, p. 7. The serpent says these words to Eve. John F. Kennedy quoted this line in his address to the Irish Parliament, Dublin (June 28, 1963); Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963, p. 537. Robert F. Kennedy used a similar quotation as a theme of his 1968 campaign for the presidential nomination: "Some men see things as they are and say, why; I dream things that never were and say, why not." Ted Kennedy quoted this variation in delivering Robert F. Kennedy's eulogy in 1968; reported in The New York Times (June 9, 1968), p. 56." to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Source: Wikiquote: "Dreams" (S) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app

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#George Bernard Shaw#things#why#dream#never
George Bernard Shaw

About George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist with a range incorporating both contemporary satire and historical allegory. He wrote more than sixty plays, including such works as Man and Superman (1902), Pygmalion (1913) and Saint Joan (1923). Shaw was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925.