Garret FitzGerald

1926–2011 · Taoiseach of Ireland and academic economist

Garret FitzGerald (9 February 1926 – 19 May 2011) was a Fine Gael politician who served two terms as Taoiseach, from June 1981 to March 1982 and from December 1982 to March 1987. Before politics he built a career in economics — working in transport planning at Aer Lingus, acting as Irish correspondent for The Economist, lecturing at University College Dublin and taking a UCD doctorate in economics in 1968, published as Planning in Ireland. That combination — a working economist running a country, with a public reputation for professorial abstraction — is precisely what made him a plausible host for a joke that had been circulating, unowned, for decades before he reached office.

Traced to source

1 quote we’ve traced

“That Works Very Well in Practice, But How Does It Work In Theory?”

Disputed

Not actually Garret FitzGerald

Often misattributed to Garret FitzGerald

Famous lines widely pinned on Garret FitzGerald that we’ve traced to someone else.

“That Works Very Well in Practice, But How Does It Work In Theory?”

actually Anonymous

Did they really say it?

Thought Garret FitzGerald said something else?

Type a quote you think Garret FitzGerald said — we’ll tell you what we know, or point you to the best sources.