Mae West: “Between two evils, I like to pick the one I haven’t tried before.”

From The Writer’s Almanac:

Today is the birthday of novelist, poet, and short-story writer Evan Connell, born in 1924 in Kansas City. He published over a dozen books in various genres. He’s best known for his novels Mrs. Bridge (1959) and Mr. Bridge (1969), and his unconventional nonfiction book Son of the Morning Star: Custer and the Little Big Horn (1984). . . .

Dorothy Parker called him “a writer of fine style and amazing variety.” Critical acclaim notwithstanding, he’s was not widely known; he tended to elude easy categorization. “My own experience [as a writer] indicates that it is mostly a career of rejection and lost illusions,” he wrote. He refused to use a computer on principle. . . .
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Today is also the birthday of actress and playwright Mae West, born in Brooklyn in 1893. She became famous for her quippy innuendoes and double entendres.

Some of her more notable quotes: “A dame that knows the ropes isn’t likely to get tied up.” And, “Between two evils, I like to pick the one I haven’t tried before.” And, “I used to be Snow White, but I drifted.”