Winners and losers
A new Sunday series
Winners and Losers by Sidney J. Harris is a collection of short, pithy aphorisms about what it means to be a good person and to live a good life.
Harris was a syndicated newspaper columnist with wide appeal — 180 newspapers carried his daily column “Strictly Personal”. This book appears to be a side project of his that reflects the broader themes of his writing, and was published in 1973 as an obvious rebuttal to the counter-culture movement. Major themes include traditional Christian virtues, personal responsibility, and self-reliance.
My dad had a copy of this book and would often refer to its parables in our daily life. He put so much stock in its wisdom that he purchased over a dozen copies to give as gifts to friends and acquaintances, which is how I got mine. As a child and young man, I enjoyed the very-1968 illustrations accompanying each aphorism more than the little sayings themselves, and didn’t see much beyond the obvious in them. As a grown man and a father, I’ve come to realize this book is one of the things my father was right about. I wish it were more widely known.
Winners and Losers is out of print, Harris is dead, and his work is mostly forgotten. I think that’s a shame, so I’m going to be publishing a few pages at a time every Sunday going forward until I run out. Harris’s estate and publisher retain the copyright on his work.
The book is divided into sections called “Scorecards”. We’ll be starting at the beginning with Scorecard One.
Enjoy.
A winner makes commitments;
a loser makes promises.
When a winner makes a mistake, he says, “I was wrong”;
when a loser makes a mistake, he says, “It wasn’t my fault.”
A winner works harder than a loser, and has more time;
a loser is always “too busy” to do what is necessary.
New additions in this series will be published every Sunday for the next several months, until I run out.






"Winners go home and screw the prom queen.
Lovers whine about 'their best'."
If you like this art style, you should check out the classic British kids show, Mr Benn.