Born on the Fourth of July (ISBN 1-888451-78-5) is the best selling autobiography of Ron Kovic, a paralyzed Vietnam War veteran who became an anti-war activist. Kovic was born on July 4, 1946, and his book's ironic title echoed a famous line from George M. Cohan's patriotic 1904 song, "The Yankee Doodle Boy" (also known as "Yankee Doodle Dandy"). The book was adapted into a 1989 Academy Award winning film of the same name co-written by Oliver Stone and Ron Kovic, starring Tom Cruise as Kovic.
Read more about Born On The Fourth Of July: Origin, Differences From The Film Adaptation, Cultural References
Famous quotes containing the words fourth of july, born on the, born, fourth and/or july:
“July 4. Statistics show that we lose more fools on this day than in all the other days of the year put together. This proves, by the number left in stock, that one Fourth of July per year is now inadequate, the country has grown so.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“Monday’s child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s child is full of grace,
Wednesday’s child is full of woe,
Thursday’s child has far to go,
Friday’s child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s child works for its living,
And a child that’s born on the Sabbath day
Is fair and wise and good and gay.”
—Mother Goose (fl. 17th–18th century. Monday’s child is fair of face (l. 1–8)
“A man of sense, though born without wit, often lives to have wit. His memory treasures up ideas and reflections; he compares them with new occurrences, and strikes out new lights from the collision. The consequence is sometimes bons mots, and sometimes apothegms.”
—Horace Walpole (1717–1797)
“‘Tis said of love that it sometimes goes, sometimes flies; runs with one, walks gravely with another; turns a third into ice, and sets a fourth in a flame: it wounds one, another it kills: like lightning it begins and ends in the same moment: it makes that fort yield at night which it besieged but in the morning; for there is no force able to resist it.”
—Miguel De Cervantes (1547–1616)
“This, it will be remembered, was the scene of Mrs. Rowlandson’s capture, and of other events in the Indian wars, but from this July afternoon, and under that mild exterior, those times seemed as remote as the irruption of the Goths. They were the dark age of New England.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)