Is there any way to dry out the muddy roads around your home on your own?

When on a teacher training course, here in the UK a couple of years ago, we were presented with a version of this quotation attributed, by the lecturer, to William Butler Yeates, upon which we were to base an ipsative assignment.

I was familiar with the Plutarch version, predating Yeates by some seventeen centuries, so asked among my classmates whether this was a trick question. For perspective, consider also that we’d recently been lectured upon accurate referencing and attribution of quotations. One, already in possession of a masters degree in another subject suggested I simply “play the game” and get on with the assignment as set.

Feeling the need to establish whether Yeates was, as so many Victorian writers had been, guilty of consciously or subconsciously plagiarising classical writers, I trawled through so many sites attributing the quotation to Yeates. One of these, which emails inspirational quotations to teachers and others in the “edubiz” is actually called “Light a Fire” and attributes the quotation to Yeates.

Dissatisfied, I contacted the National Library of Ireland, inquiring as to whether Yeates was ever recorded as having used the phrase in print, or if he had voiced it anywhere. They referred me to Plutarch’s “on Attending Lectures” asserting that Yeates, to their knowledge had not used it.

I’m convinced now that Yeates never used the phrase, or any variation of it, but am perplexed as to how he is commonly believed to have done so. I’m also disappointed that Further Education here in the UK seems to lack the rigour I had expected.

Are there more dirt and gravel roads where you live — or more asphalt and concrete roads?