The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (618 page)

1659
Proverbs
(English) 12
All work and no play, makes Jack a dull boy.
1825
Harry & Lucy Concluded
II. 155
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack mere toy.
1859
Self-Help
xi.
‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy’ but all play and no work makes him something greatly worse.
1898
Voces Academicae
I
. i.
‘Is that why you give garden parties yourself, eh? .. all work and no play makes Jill a very—’…‘Plain girl. She is that already.’
1979
Gemstone
xi.
‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,’ he observed, pouring the champagne into a glass.
1994
Mr. Donaghue Investigates
(1997) xi. 73
Do you catch me trying to reconstruct people's noses .. while I'm on holiday? Of course you don't. You know what they say—all work and no play ..
recreation
;
work

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

Commonly known as ‘Parkinson's Law,’ after Professor C. Northcote Parkinson, who first propounded it.
1955
in
Economist
19 Nov. 635
It is a commonplace observation that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.
1972
Social Psychology of Work
viii.
‘Parkinson's Law’ is that ‘work expands so as to fill the time available.’
1976
Scotsman
25 Nov. 14
Though there are fewer Bills than usual, MPs, being well known as exemplars of Parkinson's law, can be relied on to stretch their work to fill all the time available and more.
efficiency and inefficiency
;
work

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

1879
Young Mrs. Jardine
III
. ix.
Working .. all day, writing .. at night .. Roderick had yet .. never spent a happier three months .. for it is not work that kills, but ‘worry.’
1909
British Weekly
8 July 333
It is worry that kills, they say, and not work …The canker of care seems to eat the life away.
stress
;
work

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search