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Who really said it

First I Brush My Teeth and Then I Sharpen My Tongue

Not Dorothy Parker — actually Oscar Levant Oscar Levant 1906–1972 · American concert pianist, composer, actor and professional wit
Disputed In copyright

The quip belongs to Oscar Levant. Quote Investigator ↗ finds it first in the Hollywood columnist Erskine Johnson’s “Hollywood Today” of 26 September 1940 — where Levant’s surname is misspelled “Lavant” — and concludes that “Oscar Levant can be credited with the statement in the 1940 citation. The linkage to Dorothy Parker was spurious.” Four further 1940s printings all name Levant. Parker’s name does not appear on the line until the 2000s.

Last verified 4 Sep 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

For presentations

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Disputed credit — copy with the correction

“First I Brush My Teeth and Then I Sharpen My Tongue” Oscar Levant, quoted in Erskine Johnson’s "Hollywood Today," 26 September 1940. Often misattributed to Dorothy Parker. Via quotle.info

The slide-ready mistake: crediting this to Dorothy Parker. Use the credit shown above instead.

Can you use it?

Still under copyright. A short, credited quote is generally fine for talks, teaching, and internal decks; for commercial, published, or large-scale reuse, get permission.

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In context

Evoking the world of Oscar Levant — American concert pianist, composer, actor and wit. Theme: "First I Brush My Teeth and Then I Sharpen My Tongue". 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 "First I Brush My Teeth and Then I Sharpen My Tongue". 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

Earliest documented printing
26 September 1940
Printed in
Erskine Johnson’s “Hollywood Today,” Santa Cruz Evening News, p. 5, col. 2
Said by
Oscar Levant — his surname set as “Lavant” in that first printing
First linked to Parker
2006, in a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette feature

Asked about his morning routine by an interviewer, Oscar Lavant cracked: “First I brush my teeth and then I sharpen my tongue.”

That is Quote Investigator’s transcription ↗ of the 1940 column, misspelling included. We have not seen the newspaper page itself — it sits behind a Newspapers.com paywall — so the wording here rests on QI’s reading of it, not on ours.

Quote Investigator: "First I Brush My Teeth and Then I Sharpen My Tongue"

How we verified this

  • Quote Investigator’s article on this quip ↗ is the anchor. It dates the earliest known printing to 26 September 1940, in the Santa Cruz Evening News, and states its conclusion plainly: Levant is to be credited, and “the linkage to Dorothy Parker was spurious.”
  • QI then lists four further 1940s citations, every one of them naming Levant: Walter Winchell ↗’s column in December 1941; Sheilah Graham ↗ in September 1946, reporting that Levant used the line in a letter to the actor John Garfield; the Reader’s Digest of December 1946; and Evan Esar’s Dictionary of Humorous Quotations of 1949.
  • Independently of QI, Wikiquote’s Oscar Levant page ↗ carries the line in its sourced section — in Esar’s wording, “The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue” — cited to Herbert Victor Prochnow’s The New Speaker’s Treasury of Wit and Wisdom (1958), p. 322. We checked that page ourselves.
  • On the other side, nothing. Wikiquote’s Dorothy Parker page ↗ does not carry this line at all — not in its sourced section, not under Attributed, not under Misattributed. QI’s earliest Parker citation is a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette feature of 4 July 2006, sixty-six years after Levant.
In copyright

The line was first published in a syndicated American newspaper column in 1940, which is after the 1930 cut-off below which US works are reliably in the public domain, so we take the conservative position and assert no public-domain status. We have not established whether the copyright in that column was renewed — renewal was required for US periodicals of that era and many were not renewed — so the true status may well be freer than stated here. We would rather understate it. This is not legal advice.

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

Often misattributed

The line travels as one of Dorothy Parker’s. It is not hers, and the paper trail is unusually clean about when the swap happened.

Dorothy Parker No source before 2006

Every citation QI locates in the 1940s names Levant. The earliest printing it finds crediting Parker is a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette feature of 4 July 2006 — sixty-six years after the first Levant citation. Her Wikiquote page ↗ does not list the line at all.

Oscar Levant 1940

Quote Investigator ↗ concludes that “Oscar Levant can be credited with the statement in the 1940 citation,” and Wikiquote sources a variant to him ↗ independently.

Levant said it; Parker inherited it sixty-six years later, for no better reason than that she is the wit people remember — see Quote Investigator’s trail ↗.

Context

Why it mattered

Levant and Parker were selling the same product in the same decades: the cruel, fast, quotable remark. He did it on radio and screen, she did it in print and at the Algonquin. When a joke of that shape comes loose from its author, it does not drift at random — it drifts toward whichever wit is still famous.

That is the whole mechanism here. The 1940s press was unanimous about Levant; nobody attached Parker’s name for another sixty-six years. By then Levant was a half-remembered figure and Parker was a brand, and a brand is a magnet.

Orphaned wisecracks drift toward the name people still recognise.

Read the full story

One detail is worth keeping, because it is the kind of thing that makes an attribution stick or slip: in the first printing the name is misspelled “Lavant.” A misspelt byline is a weak handle. It makes a line harder to search for, harder to index, and easier to detach from its author — and a detached line goes looking for a better-known home.

We have not seen the 1940 page ourselves; it is paywalled at Newspapers.com. QI reports having read it, and we cite QI as the reader rather than claiming the newspaper as ours.

Explore

Filed under

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

Character Work

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.

Quote Investigator — this quipquoteinvestigator.com

The investigation this page defers to: the 1940 Levant citation, four 1940s corroborations, and the 2006 arrival of Parker’s name.
Wikiquote — Oscar Levanten.wikiquote.org

Carries the quip in its sourced section, cited to Prochnow’s New Speaker’s Treasury of Wit and Wisdom (1958), p. 322.
Wikipedia — Oscar Levanten.wikipedia.org

Biography of the pianist, composer and wit the line actually belongs to (1906–1972).
Wikiquote — Dorothy Parkeren.wikiquote.org

Parker’s quotation page, which does not list this line anywhere — including in its Misattributed section.
Wikipedia — Dorothy Parkeren.wikipedia.org

Biography of the writer the quip drifted to.
Wikipedia — Walter Winchellen.wikipedia.org

The columnist whose December 1941 printing is one of the four 1940s citations naming Levant.

The author

About Oscar Levant

Oscar Levant

1906–1972 · American concert pianist, composer, actor and wit

Oscar Levant (27 December 1906 – 14 August 1972) was an American concert pianist and composer who became far better known as a professional talker — on the radio quiz Information, Please!, in films, and on his own television shows. He built a public character out of neurosis and insult, and the self-deprecating one-liner was his stock in trade, which is exactly why a joke about sharpening your tongue sits naturally on him. It is also why his lines are so easy to lose: Levant’s fame faded, Parker’s did not, and orphaned wisecracks drift toward the name people still recognise.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

The primary source (Chicago)

Johnson, Erskine. “Hollywood Today.” Santa Cruz Evening News (Santa Cruz, CA), 26 September 1940, p. 5, col. 2. Earliest documented printing per Quote Investigator; the surname is set there as “Lavant.”

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘First I Brush My Teeth and Then I Sharpen My Tongue’?” Last verified 4 Sep 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/first-i-brush-my-teeth-and-then-i-sharpen-my-tongue/

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