# Did Sophocles write "Success is dependent on effort"? Tags: quotes - Score: 20 - Views: 4089 - Answers: 1 - Answered: yes - Asked by: Tom Zych (468 rep) - Asked: 2014-08-29 - Edited: 2023-04-26 - Site: skeptics ## Question I'm trying to find the source of the quote "Success is dependent on effort." There are lots and lots of quotation sites that attribute it to Sophocles. However, I have yet to find a single site that attributes it to any particular work of Sophocles, or to a witness who wrote of Sophocles having said it. The page on Wikiquote, which does require citations, doesn't have it, and no one's brought it up on the talk page. I suspect all these sites are just copying each other, and no one has any idea whether it's actually from Sophocles or not. Are there any classics scholars out there who can supply a reliable source or a reliable refutation? ## Answers ### Answer by ChrisW (score: 30 [ACCEPTED]) The quote is from Electra: for example, in one translation, ELECTRA Remember, nothing succeeds without toil. There's a bilingual version of it here, in English, Electra [945] Remember, nothing succeeds without toil. And in Greek, Ἠλέκτρα ὅρα, πόνου τοι χωρ