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Who really said it

My way of joking is to tell the truth. That's the funniest joke in the world

Not Muhammad Ali — actually George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw 1856–1950 · Irish playwright & critic
Disputed Free to reuse

The line belongs to Peter Keegan, the defrocked priest in Shaw’s comedy John Bull’s Other Island, Act II — written and staged in 1904, published 1907. Shaw’s wording is “It’s the funniest joke in the world”; the version pinned on Muhammad Ali swaps in “That’s.”

Last verified 22 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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Disputed credit — copy with the correction

“My way of joking is to tell the truth. It's the funniest joke in the world.” George Bernard Shaw, John Bull's Other Island, Act II (1904; published 1907). Often misattributed to Muhammad Ali.

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

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In context

Evoking the world of George Bernard Shaw — Irish playwright, critic & Nobel laureate. Theme: "My way of joking is to tell the truth. That's the funniest joke in the world". 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 "My way of joking is to tell the truth. That's the funniest joke in the world". 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 primary source

Work
John Bull’s Other Island
Location
Act II — spoken by Peter Keegan to Nora Reilly
Written / staged
1904 (premiered Royal Court Theatre, London, 1 November 1904)
First published
1907

NORA. But really and truly now, weren’t the people rather disappointing? I should think the girls must have seemed rather coarse and dowdy after the foreign princesses and people? But I suppose a priest wouldn’t notice that.

KEEGAN. It’s a priest’s business to notice everything. I won’t tell you all I noticed about women; but I’ll tell you this. The more a man knows, and the farther he travels, the more likely he is to marry a country girl afterwards.

NORA. You’re joking, Mr Keegan: I’m sure yar.

KEEGAN. My way of joking is to tell the truth. It’s the funniest joke in the world. Act II

Transcribed from the Project Gutenberg text of the play (eBook #3612), Act II.

Read Act II at Project Gutenberg

How we verified this

Public domain

John Bull’s Other Island was written and staged in 1904 and first published in 1907 — well before 1931 — so the play’s text, including this line, is in the public domain in the United States. Shaw wrote in English, so no translation rights are involved.

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.

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Fact-check

The Muhammad Ali problem

Ali is credited with this line across essentially every large quote database, always in a slightly altered form and never with a source attached.

Muhammad Ali No source

A-Z Quotes carries the wording “That’s the funniest joke in the world” under Ali’s name and dates the entry to a Twitter post of 30 July 2009 ↗, with no book, interview or broadcast behind it.

“That’s” vs “It’s” Altered

Shaw’s text reads “It’s the funniest joke in the world” — confirmed in the Project Gutenberg full text ↗. The Ali-branded version substitutes “That’s,” the usual signature of a line passed along by memory rather than copied from a page.

George Bernard Shaw Correct

Wikiquote files the line in its sourced Shaw section ↗ under John Bull’s Other Island (1907), Act II.

The words are Shaw’s, written for a fictional Irish priest in 1904 — nearly four decades before Muhammad Ali was born (1942) — and are there in the play’s Act II text ↗ to be read.

Context

Why Keegan says it

Peter Keegan is Shaw’s holy fool — a priest stripped of his parish who wanders the Irish countryside seeing more clearly than anyone with a job. In Act II he tells Nora Reilly that the more a man knows and the farther he travels, the likelier he is to end up marrying a country girl. She assumes he is teasing her.

His reply is the play’s thesis in one sentence: the truth, said plainly in a world organised around polite evasion, lands as comedy. It is also a fair description of Shaw’s own method across four decades of playwriting.

“You’re joking, Mr Keegan: I’m sure yar.”

How the line drifted to Muhammad Ali

Ali is one of the internet’s strongest quote magnets: he was genuinely funny, genuinely blunt, and genuinely quotable, so aphorisms about truth-telling and bravado attach to him easily. A Shaw line about joking by telling the truth reads as something Ali could have said in a press conference — which is exactly the condition under which misattribution spreads.

The quote-database trail is thin. A-Z Quotes dates its Ali entry to a Twitter post of 30 July 2009 and offers no book, interview or broadcast behind it — a social-media origin, not a documentary one.

Explore

Filed under

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

Truth Wisdom Character

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.

John Bull's Other Island — full textgutenberg.org

Project Gutenberg eBook #3612; the Keegan line appears verbatim in Act II.
George Bernard Shaw — sourced quotationswikiquote.org

Lists the line in the sourced section under John Bull's Other Island (1907), Act II.
John Bull's Other Island on Wikisourcewikisource.org

Transcribed play text; notes it was written and staged 1904, published 1907.
Quote Investigator on truth-telling as a jokequoteinvestigator.com

Quotes Keegan's line and dates the play to 1904 (published 1907) while tracing the wider family of sayings.
John Bull's Other Island — backgroundwikipedia.org

Confirms Shaw wrote the play in 1904, premiered at the Royal Court on 1 November 1904, and describes Peter Keegan.

The real author

Who actually wrote it

George Bernard Shaw

1856–1950 · Irish playwright, critic & Nobel laureate

George Bernard Shaw was an Irish dramatist and critic whose plays — Man and Superman, Pygmalion, Saint Joan — made comedy a vehicle for argument. He specialised in characters who disarm opponents by saying exactly what they mean, which is precisely the joke Peter Keegan makes in John Bull’s Other Island. Shaw won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source

George Bernard Shaw, John Bull’s Other Island, Act II (written and staged 1904; published London: Constable, 1907). Full text: Project Gutenberg eBook #3612.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘My way of joking is to tell the truth. That's the funniest joke in the world’?” Last verified 22 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/my-way-of-joking-is-to-tell-the-truth-thats-the-funniest/

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