Mahatma Gandhi

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869–1948) trained as a lawyer in London, developed satyagraha — truth-force, or non-violent resistance — during twenty-one years in South Africa, and led India’s independence movement on that principle before being assassinated in 1948. He is unusually quotable and unusually well documented: his Collected Works run to roughly a hundred searchable volumes. That combination is why so many quotes bearing his name can be checked, and why so many fail the check. Several of the most shared — including “first they ignore you” and, in its familiar wording, “be the change” — are not his; we say so, and name the likely real source.