Wikiquote API: Get quotes by person
Gets sourced, disputed and misattributed quotations for a person from their English Wikiquote page. Sourced quotes are included only when a citation or identified work appears on the page; Wikiquote attribution is not independent verification.
Unofficial. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Wikiquote.
Inputs
Values from the run on Oct 31, 2026, shown under Output.
- Person, required
person The person to look up, for example Albert Einstein.
Albert Einstein
- Max Results optional
max_results Maximum number of sourced quotes to return, for example 50.
50
Whole number from 1 to 200. Default
50.
Input as JSON
{ "person": "Albert Einstein", "max_results": 50}Output
{ "name": "Albert Einstein", "page_link": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein" , "description": "Albert Einstein ( 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955 ) was a Jewish German theoretical physicist , widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest physicists of all time.", "sourced_quotes": [ { "year": 1896, "quote": "Un homme heureux est trop content du présent pour trop se soucier de l'avenir.", "source": "From \"Mes Projets d'Avenir\", a French essay written at age 18 for a school exam (18 September 1896). The Collected Papers of Albert Einstein Vol. 1 (1987) Doc. 22." }, { "year": 1905, "quote": "Lieber Habicht! / Es herrscht ein weihevolles Stillschweigen zwischen uns, so daß es mir fast wie eine sündige Entweihung vorkommt, wenn ich es jetzt durch ein wenig bedeutsames Gepappel unterbreche... / Was machen Sie denn, Sie eingefrorener Walfisch, Sie getrocknetes, eingebüchstes Stück Seele...?", "source": "Opening of a letter to his friend Conrad Habicht in which he describes his four revolutionary Annus Mirabilis papers (18 or 25 May 1905) Doc. 27" }, { "year": 1905, "quote": "E=mc²", "source": "The equation originally expressed the equivalence of mass and energy as m = L/c² , which easily translates into the far more well-known E = mc² in Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content? published in the Annalen der Physik (27 September 1905) : \"If a body gives off the energy L in…" } ], "disputed_quotes": [ { "note": "As quoted in Journal of France and Germany (1942–1944) by Gilbert Fowler White , in excerpt published in Living with Nature's Extremes: The Life of Gilbert Fowler White (2006) by Robert E. Hinshaw, p. 62. From the context it seems that White did not specify whether he had heard Einstein himself say …", "quote": "There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is." }, { "note": "No known source; it appears to be a paraphrase of the last sentence of Einstein's \"An Ideal of Service to Our Fellow Man\" . Earliest known attribution is in the Washington Afro-American , AFRO Magazine Section , September 21, 1954, p. 2", "quote": "It is high time the ideal of success should be replaced with the ideal of service." }, { "note": "Attributed in FBI Memo, February 13, 1950 (item 61-4099-25 in Einstein's FBI file—viewable online as p. 72 of \"Albert Einstein Part 1 of 14\" here , as well as p. 72 of the pdf file which can be downloaded here ). There is no other information in the FBI's released files as to what source attributed …", "quote": "In December, 1947, he made the following statement: \"I came to America because of the great, great freedom which I heard existed in this country. I made a mistake in selecting America as a land of freedom, a mistake I cannot repair in the balance of my life.\"" } ], "misattributed_quotes": [ { "note": "Variants : I fear the day when the technology overlaps with our humanity. The world will only have a generation of idiots. I fear the day when technology overlaps our humanity. It will be then that the world will have permanent ensuing generations of idiots. 1995 film Powder includes a similar quota…", "quote": "I fear the day that technology will surpass our human interaction. The world will have a generation of idiots." }, { "note": "This or similar statements are more often misattributed to Herbert Spencer , but the source of the phrase \"contempt prior to investigation\" seems to have been William Paley , A View of the Evidences of Christianity (1794): \"The infidelity of the Gentile world, and that more especially of men of rank…", "quote": "Contempt prior to investigation is what enslaves a mind to Ignorance." }, { "note": "Attributed in \"The Conflict Between Church And State In The Third Reich\", by S. Parkes Cadman , La Crosse Tribune and Leader-Press (28 October 1934), viewable online on p. 9 of the issue here (double-click the page to zoom). The quote is preceded by \"In this connection it is worth quoting in free tr…", "quote": "Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers whose flam…" } ]}Code
curl https://api.fous.com/v1/runs \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $FOUS_API_KEY" \ -H "Content-Type: application/json" \ -d '{"method":"wikiquote.org/get_quotes_by_person","input":{"person":"Albert Einstein","max_results":50}}' # Save as fous.py, then run: python3 fous.pyimport json, os, timefrom urllib.error import HTTPErrorfrom urllib.request import Request, urlopenAPI = "https://api.fous.com/v1/runs" KEY = os.environ["FOUS_API_KEY"]HEADERS = { "Authorization": f"Bearer {KEY}", "Content-Type": "application/json" ,}def call(url, body=None): data = json.dumps(body).encode() if body else None request = Request(url, data, HEADERS) try: with urlopen(request, timeout=120) as r: return r.status, json.load(r) except HTTPError as error: message = json.load(error)["error"]["message"] raise RuntimeError(message) from errorstatus, run = call(API, { "method": "wikiquote.org/get_quotes_by_person" , "input": { "person": "Albert Einstein", "max_results": 50 }})# 202: still going after 30 s. Ask again until it ends.while status == 202: time.sleep(2) status, run = call(f"{API}/{run['id']}")print(json.dumps(run["data"], indent=2))// Save as fous.mjs, then run: node fous.mjsconst api = "https://api.fous.com/v1/runs" ;const headers = { Authorization: `Bearer ${process.env.FOUS_API_KEY}`, "Content-Type": "application/json" ,};let response = await fetch(api, { method: "POST", headers, body: JSON.stringify({ "method": "wikiquote.org/get_quotes_by_person" , "input": { "person": "Albert Einstein", "max_results": 50 } }), signal: AbortSignal.timeout(120_000),});let run = await response.json();// 202: still going after 30 s. Ask again until it ends.while (response.status === 202) { await new Promise((done) => setTimeout(done, 2_000)); response = await fetch(`${api}/${run.id}`, { headers }); run = await response.json();}if (!response.ok) throw new Error(run.error.message);console.log(run.data);# Connect your agent to Fous once, over MCP (Streamable HTTP):# https://api.fous.com/mcp# Set FOUS_API_KEY first: create a key at https://app.fous.com/keys.# Claude Codeclaude mcp add \ --scope user \ --transport http fous https://api.fous.com/mcp \ --header "Authorization: Bearer ${FOUS_API_KEY:?Set FOUS_API_KEY to your Fous API key}"# Codexcodex mcp add fous \ --url https://api.fous.com/mcp \ --bearer-token-env-var FOUS_API_KEY# Cursor, VS Code, Windsurf, Cline and morenpx -y add-mcp https://api.fous.com/mcp -g -n fous \ --header "Authorization: Bearer ${FOUS_API_KEY:?Set FOUS_API_KEY to your Fous API key}"# Then ask your agent:# "Use Fous to run wikiquote.org/get_quotes_by_person# with {"person":"Albert Einstein","max_results":50}"Over HTTP, the answer’s data holds the output. A run still going after 30 seconds answers 202 with its id: ask GET /v1/runs/{id} until it ends.
Schema
Input schema
{ "type": "object", "required": [ "person" ], "properties": { "person": { "type": "string", "minLength": 1, "description": "The person to look up, for example Albert Einstein." }, "max_results": { "type": "integer", "default": 50, "maximum": 200, "minimum": 1, "description": "Maximum number of sourced quotes to return, for example 50." } }}Output schema
{ "type": "object", "required": [ "name", "description", "sourced_quotes", "disputed_quotes", "misattributed_quotes", "page_link" ], "properties": { "name": { "type": "string", "description": "Person name as on Wikiquote." }, "page_link": { "type": "string" }, "description": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "description": "One-line description of the person." }, "sourced_quotes": { "type": "array", "items": { "type": "object", "required": [ "quote", "source", "year" ], "properties": { "year": { "type": [ "integer", "null" ] }, "quote": { "type": "string" }, "source": { "type": "string" } }, "additionalProperties": false } }, "disputed_quotes": { "type": "array", "items": { "type": "object", "required": [ "quote", "note" ], "properties": { "note": { "type": [ "string", "null" ] }, "quote": { "type": "string" } }, "additionalProperties": false } }, "misattributed_quotes": { "type": "array", "items": { "type": "object", "required": [ "quote", "note" ], "properties": { "note": { "type": [ "string", "null" ] }, "quote": { "type": "string" } }, "additionalProperties": false } } }, "additionalProperties": false}- Price
- 1 credit per completed run (1¢ with pay as you go); failed runs are free.
- Method
wikiquote.org/get_quotes_by_person- Returns
- name, description, sourced quotes with source and year, disputed quotes, misattributed quotes, page link
Use it from your agent
Give your agent this line. It reads SKILL.md, gets a Fous API key and connects the Fous MCP server. Its run then takes the method wikiquote.org/get_quotes_by_person with the inputs above.
Ask your agent
- What are some well-sourced quotes from Maya Angelou, and which ones floating around online are actually misattributed?
- Pull up to 20 cited quotations by Winston Churchill from Wikiquote, with the work and year each one came from.
- I keep seeing 'Be the change you wish to see in the world' credited to Gandhi — is that disputed or misattributed? Show me his verified quotes too.
- Give me 100 attributed quotes from Mark Twain's Wikiquote page, plus any listed as disputed.
- Need a handful of quotes by Marie Curie with their sources for a presentation — about 10 is fine.
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