This habit of reading … is your pass to the most perfect pleasure that God has prepared for his creatures. It lasts when all other pleasures fade. It will make your hours pleasant to you as long as you live.
—Anthony Trollope (1815–82) English Novelist
That is a very good question. I don’t know the answer. But can you tell me the name of a classical Greek shoemaker?
—Arthur Miller (1915–2005) American Playwright, Essayist
The printing press is either the greatest blessing or the greatest curse of modern times, sometimes one forgets which it is.
—J. M. Barrie (1860–1937) Scottish Novelist, Dramatist
Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind.
—James Russell Lowell (1819–91) American Poet, Critic
Books support us in our solitude and keep us from being a burden to ourselves.
—Jeremy Collier (1650–1726) Anglican Church Historian, Clergyman
Literature is without proofs. By which it must be understood that it cannot prove, not only what it says, but even that it is worth the trouble of saying it.
—Roland Barthes (1915–80) French Writer, Critic, Teacher
The artist is of no importance. Only what he creates is important, since there is nothing new to be said. Shakespeare, Balzac, Homer have all written about the same things, and if they had lived one thousand or two thousand years longer, the publishers wouldn’t have needed anyone since.
—William Faulkner (1897–1962) American Novelist
Don’t join the book burners. Don’t think you are going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don’t be afraid to go in your library and read every book.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969) American Head of State, Military Leader
There is no mistaking a real book when one meets it. It is like falling in love, and like that colossal adventure it is an experience of great social import. Even as the tranced swain, the booklover yearns to tell others of his bliss. He writes letters about it, adds it to the postscript of all manner of communications, intrudes it into telephone messages, and insists on his friends writing down the title of the find. Like the simple-hearted betrothed, once certain of his conquest, “I want you to love her, too!” It is a jealous passion also. He feels a little indignant if he finds that any one else has discovered the book, too.
—Christopher Morley (1890–1957) American Novelist, Journalist, Poet, Essayist
Books and proverbs receive their chief value from the stamp and esteem of ages through which they have passed.
—William Temple (1881–1944) English Theologian, Archbishop
A truly good book teaches me better than to read it. I must soon lay it down, and commence living on its hint. What I began by reading, I must finish by acting.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
There is no book so poor that it would not be a prodigy if wholly wrought out by a single mind, without the aid of prior investigators.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
A book is a gift you can open again and again.
—Garrison Keillor (b.1942) American Author, Humorist, Radio Personality
Everything you need for your better future and success has already been written. And guess what? It’s all available. All you have to do is go to the library.
—Jim Rohn (1930–2009) American Entrepreneur, Author, Motivational Speaker
He who lends a book is an idiot. He who returns the book is more of an idiot.
—Arabic Proverb
Literature does not exist in a vacuum. Writers as such have a definite social function exactly proportional to their ability as writers. This is their main use.
—Ezra Pound (1885-1972) American Poet, Translator, Critic
The decline of literature indicates the decline of the nation. The two keep pace in their downward tendency.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Leisure without literature is death and burial alive.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
O, let my books be then the eloquence and dumb presages of my speaking breast.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
The best effect of any book, is that it excites the reader to self-activity.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
Some books are undeservedly forgotten; none are undeservedly remembered.
—W. H. Auden (1907–73) British-born American Poet, Dramatist
All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. American writing comes from that. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since.
—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American Author, Journalist, Short Story Writer
One sheds one’s sicknesses in books—repeats and presents again one’s emotions, to be master of them.
—D. H. Lawrence (1885–1930) English Novelist, Playwright, Poet, Essayist, Critic
The oldest books are still only just out to those who have not read them.
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902) British Victorian Novelist, Essayist, Critic
As well almost kill a man, as kill a good book; for the life of the one is but a few short years, while that of the other may be for ages.—Who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God’s image; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself; kills as it were, the image of God.
—John Milton (1608–74) English Poet, Civil Servant, Scholar, Debater
Books are divided into two classes, the books of the hour and the books of all time.
—John Ruskin (1819–1900) English Writer, Art Critic
The man who is fond of books is usually a man of lofty thought, and of elevated opinions.
—George Dawson (1821–76) English Nonconformist Preacher, Activist
If the most significant characteristic of man is the complex of biological needs he shares with all members of his species, then the best lives for the writer to observe are those in which the role of natural necessity is clearest, namely, the lives of the very poor.
—W. H. Auden (1907–73) British-born American Poet, Dramatist
The society of dead authors has this advantage over that of the living: they never flatter us to our faces, nor slander us behind our backs, nor intrude upon our privacy, nor quit their shelves until we take them down.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
Books are a guide in youth, and an entertainment for age. They support us under solitude, and keep us from becoming a burden to ourselves. They help us to forget the crossness of men and things, compose our cares and our passions, and lay our disappointments asleep. When we are weary of the living, we may repair to the dead, who have nothing of peevishness, pride, or design in their conversation.
—Jeremy Collier (1650–1726) Anglican Church Historian, Clergyman
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