March 31: Notable Births, with Quotes
Let’s celebrate these public figures, some currently gracing the headlines and others who made their mark in years past, born on March 31.
Ewan McGregor, actor (March 31, 1971–present)
“‘Star Wars’ didn’t really feel right to me. Initially I was quite skeptical about doing it. I just thought, ‘’Well, I’m this independent, urban-y, grungy actor over here. I’m not this kind of guy.’” —Ewan McGregor
Ross, Dalton. “Inside the 17-year journey to reunite Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen for Obi-Wan Kenobi.” Entertainment Weekly, March 10, 2022, https://ew.com/tv/obi-wan-kenobi-ewan-mcgregor-hayden-christensen-cover-story/.
“Now I meet the people who we made those films for, who were the kids of the time. And our ‘Star Wars’ films are their ‘Star Wars’ films. In the way that Carrie Fisher and Alec Guinness and Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford’s films were ours, we’re theirs. And that’s beautiful that they were important to the kids who we made them for. It’s just so nice to finally get that wave of positivity about them.” —Ewan McGregor
Ross, Dalton. “Inside the 17-year journey to reunite Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen for Obi-Wan Kenobi.” Entertainment Weekly, March 10, 2022, https://ew.com/tv/obi-wan-kenobi-ewan-mcgregor-hayden-christensen-cover-story/.
Al Gore, politician and environmentalist (March 31, 1948–present)
“Sometimes, without warning, the future knocks on our door with a precious and painful vision of what might be.” —Al Gore
Gore, Al. “Al Gore Nobel Lecture.” The Nobel Prize, December 10, 2007, https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2007/gore/lecture/.
“Unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless, and odorless – which has helped keep the truth about what it is doing to our climate out of sight and out of mind. Moreover, the catastrophe now threatening us is unprecedented – and we often confuse the unprecedented with the improbable.” —Al Gore
Gore, Al. “Al Gore Nobel Lecture.” The Nobel Prize, December 10, 2007, https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2007/gore/lecture/.
Herb Alpert, musician (March 31, 1935–present)
“If we tried to start A&M in today’s environment, we’d have no chance. I don’t know if I’d get a start as a trumpet player. But I keep doing this because I’m having fun.” —Herb Alpert
PopMatters Staff. “Over the Rainbow: An Interview with Herb Alpert.” PopMatters, October 17, 2019, https://www.popmatters.com/herb-alpert-2019-interview-2640921806.html.
“I listen to jazz a lot. I like free-form music. I think the whole key is to find your own voice. I know I have my own voice.” —Herb Alpert
PopMatters Staff. “Over the Rainbow: An Interview with Herb Alpert.” PopMatters, October 17, 2019, https://www.popmatters.com/herb-alpert-2019-interview-2640921806.html.
Shirley Jones, actor and singer (March 31, 1934–present)
“I have always liked to shock people a bit. Despite my age, I still do.” —Shirley Jones
Fallow, Allan. “Shirley Jones Casts Off Squeaky-Clean Image In Tell-All Autobiography.” AARP, August 16, 2013, https://www.aarp.org/entertainment/books/info-08-2013/shirley-jones-discusses-memoir.html.
“When I did my screen test for ‘Oklahoma!,’ I flew out to California, and Fred Zinnemann, the director, asked if I’d ever acted in front of a camera before. I said, ‘No,’ and he said, ‘You’re a natural.’” —Shirley Jones
Fallow, Allan. “Shirley Jones Casts Off Squeaky-Clean Image In Tell-All Autobiography.” AARP, August 16, 2013, https://www.aarp.org/entertainment/books/info-08-2013/shirley-jones-discusses-memoir.html.
Cesar Chavez, labor leader and activist (March 31, 1927–April 23, 1993)
“All my life, I have been driven by one dream, one goal, one vision: to overthrow a farm labor system in this nation that treats farm workers as if they were not important human beings. Farm workers are not agricultural implements; they are not beasts of burden to be used and discarded.” —Cesar Chavez
Chavez, Cesar. “Cesar Chavez: Commonwealth Club Address.” UC San Diego, November 9, 1984, https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/CESAR%20CHAVEZ%20COMMONWEALTH%20SPEECH.pdf.
“I’m not very different from anyone else who has ever tried to accomplish something with his life. My motivation comes from my personal life, from watching what my mother and father went through when I was growing up, from what we experienced as migrant workers in California.” —Cesar Chavez
Chavez, Cesar. “Cesar Chavez: Commonwealth Club Address.” UC San Diego, November 9, 1984, https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/CESAR%20CHAVEZ%20COMMONWEALTH%20SPEECH.pdf.
Rene Descartes, philosopher and mathematician (March 31, 1596–February 11, 1650)
“Good sense is, of all things among men, the most equally distributed; for every one thinks himself so abundantly provided with it, that those even who are the most difficult to satisfy in everything else, do not usually desire a larger measure of this quality than they already possess.” —Rene Descartes
Descartes, Rene. “Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting the Reason, and Seeking Truth in the Sciences.” Project Gutenberg, February 14, 2016, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/59/59-h/59-h.htm.
“The long chains of simple and easy reasonings by means of which geometers are accustomed to reach the conclusions of their most difficult demonstrations, had led me to imagine that all things, to the knowledge of which man is competent, are mutually connected in the same way, and that there is nothing so far removed from us as to be beyond our reach, or so hidden that we cannot discover it, provided only we abstain from accepting the false for the true, and always preserve in our thoughts the order necessary for the deduction of one truth from another.” —Rene Descartes
Descartes, Rene. “Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting the Reason, and Seeking Truth in the Sciences.” Project Gutenberg, February 14, 2016, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/59/59-h/59-h.htm.
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