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Who really said it

Either write something worth reading or do something worth the writing

Close — but Franklin wrote ‘things’, not ‘something’ Benjamin Franklin 1706–1790 · American printer, scientist & statesman
Disputed Free to reuse

Franklin printed the adage in Poor Richard, An Almanack for the Year of Christ 1738, interleaved with the astronomical entries for May. His wording was ‘Either write things worth reading, or do things worth the writing’ — the last two lines of a four-line verse that opens ‘If you wou’d not be forgotten / As soon as you are dead and rotten’. The circulating version swaps ‘things’ for ‘something’ and drops the couplet that gave it its point. Quote Investigator also finds the core saying eleven years earlier, in a 1727 collection by the physician Thomas Fuller, so Franklin adapted rather than coined it.

Last verified 29 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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Disputed wording — copy with the correction

“Either write something worth reading or do something worth the writing” Not quite — Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanack for 1738 reads 'Either write things worth reading, or do things worth the writing', as the last two lines of a four-line verse; the core saying is older still, in Thomas Fuller's Introductio ad Prudentiam (1727). Provenance traced at quotle.info

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In context

Evoking the themes of purpose and creativity. Theme: "Either write something worth reading or do something worth the writing". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Minimalist

Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "Either write something worth reading or do something worth the writing". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Provenance

The source

Work
Poor Richard, An Almanack for the Year of Christ 1738
Author
Benjamin Franklin, writing as ‘Poor Richard’
Where on the page
Interleaved with the astronomical entries for May 1738
Earlier form
Thomas Fuller, Introductio ad Prudentiam (1727), saying no. 686

If you wou’d not be forgotten
As soon as you are dead and rotten,
Either write things worth reading,
Or do things worth the writing. ↑ the popular version keeps the last two lines and swaps ‘things’ for ‘something’

The two sources we read differ by one capital letter: Wikiquote’s 1738 section prints ‘Or do things worth the writing’, Quote Investigator’s transcription of the same almanac page prints ‘or do things worth the writing’. Nothing else in the verse differs between them.

Poor Richard's Almanack, 1738 — Wikiquote

How we traced it

  • Quote Investigator ↗ transcribes the entry from the 1738 almanac itself and prints all four lines: ‘If you wou’d not be forgotten / As soon as you are dead and rotten, / Either write things worth reading, / or do things worth the writing.’ It notes the phrases were interleaved with the astronomical facts for May 1738.
  • Wikiquote’s Poor Richard’s Almanack page ↗ carries the same verse under its 1738 section and links the scanned almanac page it comes from — the same scan QI worked from. Two transcriptions of that page agreeing on ‘things’ is what rules the ‘something’ wording out.
  • The idea is older than Franklin. QI quotes saying no. 686 from Introductio ad Prudentiam, compiled by Thomas Fuller (1654–1734) ↗, an English physician and writer: ‘If thou wouldest win Immortality of Name, either do things worth the writing, or write things worth the reading.’ QI dates the first edition to 1727 and says it verified the quotation against scans of the 1731 third edition, page 40.
  • QI quotes the biographer J. A. Leo Lemay (The Life of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 2, p. 211) arguing that Franklin combined that learned saying with a common sampler rhyme — ‘When I am dead and all my bones are rotten…’ — to produce the version in the almanac.
Public domain

Both texts are far older than the 1931 US public-domain threshold: Franklin’s almanac for 1738 and Fuller’s Introductio ad Prudentiam (1727) are long out of copyright, so the verse and the earlier saying are free to reuse. The modern paraphrase has no identified author, but it is a trivial rewording of a public-domain line rather than a separate work.

Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.

Fact-check

What actually happened to this line

Nobody is falsely credited here — Franklin really did publish it. Two other things went wrong: the words drifted, and the credit for inventing it landed on the wrong man.

Franklin wrote ‘things’, not ‘something’ wording drift

The almanac reads ‘Either write things worth reading, or do things worth the writing’, and it is the tail of a rhyme about being forgotten once you are dead and rotten. The popular version singularises both nouns and throws the rhyme away compare the transcription ↗.

Thomas Fuller printed it first Adapter, not coiner

Fuller’s Introductio ad Prudentiam (1727) already had ‘If thou wouldest win Immortality of Name, either do things worth the writing, or write things worth the reading’. QI notes Franklin read contemporary compilations and routinely reworked what he found in them QI on the 1727 collection ↗.

A sampler rhyme supplied the opening couplet ancestor

On Lemay’s reading, quoted by QI, the ‘dead and rotten’ lines come from a common verse found on samplers, which Franklin grafted onto the learned saying. QI presents this as Lemay’s suggestion, not as a documented fact about Franklin’s method read the passage ↗.

The line is Franklin’s to print but not his to invent, and the words people quote are not the words he set. Quote Investigator’s full investigation ↗ has the 1738 page and the 1727 antecedent side by side.

Context

Why the drift matters here

Franklin’s almanacs are one of the largest single sources of sayings credited to him, and many of them were not his. He read the proverb collections of his day, picked what he liked, and sharpened it. Quote Investigator makes the point plainly: many of the statements credited to Franklin today were printed in these almanacs, and many of those he did not coin.

That is exactly what happened here, twice over — he reworked someone else’s adage, and then two and a half centuries of requoting reworked his. What survives is a self-help slogan. What he printed was a joke about being forgotten.

What survives is a self-help slogan. What he printed was a joke about being forgotten.

The verse in full

If you wou’d not be forgotten / As soon as you are dead and rotten, / Either write things worth reading, / Or do things worth the writing.

Read whole, it is advice about posterity with a shrug in it. The modern two-line version reads as a productivity maxim, which is a different sentiment arrived at by deletion.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Purpose Creativity

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Either Write Things Worth Reading or Do Things Worth the Writingquoteinvestigator.com

The full investigation: the 1738 almanac transcription, the 1727 Fuller antecedent, and Lemay on how Franklin assembled it.
Poor Richard's Almanack — 1738 sayingsen.wikiquote.org

The verse as printed, under the almanac year it appeared in, with a link to the scanned page.
Thomas Fuller (1654–1734)en.wikipedia.org

The English physician and writer who compiled Introductio ad Prudentiam — not the 17th-century historian of the same name.
Poor Richard's Almanacken.wikipedia.org

Background on the almanac series Franklin published under the Richard Saunders pseudonym from 1732.
Benjamin Franklin — Wikiquoteen.wikiquote.org

Franklin's sourced, attributed and misattributed quotations. This verse is not on it; the almanac has its own page.
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklinwww.gutenberg.org

Franklin in his own words, free to read — including his account of starting the almanac.

The author

About Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin

1706–1790 · American printer, scientist & statesman

Benjamin Franklin was a printer first. From 1732 he published Poor Richard’s Almanack under the pseudonym Richard Saunders, filling the calendar margins with proverbs he collected, rewrote and occasionally invented — which is why so many sayings are credited to him and so few originated with him. The rest of the career is well known: the electrical experiments, the diplomacy in France, and a hand in both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. He died in Philadelphia in 1790.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

The primary source (Chicago)

Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard, An Almanack For the Year of Christ 1738 (Philadelphia, 1738), entry for May. Earlier form: Thomas Fuller, Introductio ad Prudentiam (London, 1727), saying no. 686 (verified by Quote Investigator against the 1731 third edition, p. 40).

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Either write something worth reading or do something worth the writing’?” Last verified 29 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/either-write-something-worth-reading-or-do-something-worth/

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