Dear Quote Investigator: Would you please explore a famous saying that apparently has been misattributed to Voltaire:
I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
The words above reportedly originated with an English author named Evelyn Beatrice Hall in 1906. There is a different version in French, but I do not think it is authentic:
Monsieur l’abbé, je déteste ce que vous écrivez, mais je donnerai ma vie pour que vous puissiez continuer à écrire.
Here is one rendering in English:
Monsieur l’abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.
What do you think?
Quote Investigator: Voltaire was the pen name of François-Marie Arouet who died in 1778. The earliest evidence of the saying appeared many years afterwards in the 1906 book “The Friends of Voltaire” by S. G. Tallentyre which was the pseudonym of historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall.
