Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them at all.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
The self-styled intellectual who is impotent with pen and ink hungers to write history with sword and blood.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
The literature of a people must spring from the sense of its nationality; and nationality is impossible without self-respect, and self-respect is impossible without liberty.
—Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–96) American Abolitionist, Author
The worst thing about new books is that they keep us from reading the old ones.
—Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French Writer, Moralist
In any situation, ask yourself: What strengths do I possess that can contribute towards accomplishing something in this situation? Then follow through.
—Indian Proverb
A beautiful literature springs from the depth and fullness of intellectual and moral life, from an energy of thought and feeling, to which nothing, as we believe, ministers so largely as enlightened religion.
—William Ellery Channing (1780–1842) American Unitarian Theologian, Poet
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
The best friend is the man who in wishing me well wishes it for my sake.
—Aristotle (384BCE–322BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scholar
How has the human spirit ever survived the terrific literature with which it has had to contend?
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955) American Poet
Literature is the expression of a feeling of deprivation, a recourse against a sense of something missing. But the contrary is also true: language is what makes us human. It is a recourse against the meaningless noise and silence of nature and history.
—Octavio Paz (1914–98) Mexican Poet, Diplomat
Literature is the immortality of speech.
—August Wilhelm Schlegel (1767–1845) German Poet, Literary Critic, Scholar
The oldest books are still only just out to those who have not read them.
—Samuel Butler
The art of letters will come to an end before A.D. 2000. I shall survive as a curiosity.
—Ezra Pound (1885-1972) American Poet, Translator, Critic
The pleasure of all reading is doubled when one lives with another who shares the same books.
—Katherine Mansfield (1888–1923) New Zealand-born British Author
One learns little more about a man from his feats of literary memory than from the feats of his alimentary canal.
—Frank Moore Colby (1865–1925) American Encyclopedia Editor, Essayist
A good metaphor is something even the police should keep an eye on.
—Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–99) German Philosopher, Physicist
The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing.
—Martin Luther (1483–1546) German Protestant Theologian
It is the story-teller’s task to elicit sympathy and a measure of understanding for those who lie outside the boundaries of State approval.
—Graham Greene (1904–91) British Novelist, Playwright, Short Story Writer
I cannot live without books.
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) American Head of State, Lawyer
Books, like friends, should be few and well chosen. Like friends, too, we should return to them again and again—for, like true friends, they will never fail us—never cease to instruct—never cloy—Next to acquiring good friends, the best acquisition is that of good books.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
The reading or non-reading a book will never keep down a single petticoat.
—Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) (1788–1824) English Romantic Poet
The man who does not read books has no advantage over the man that can not read them.
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
Books, not which afford us a cowering enjoyment, but in which each thought is of unusual daring; such as an idle man cannot read, and a timid one would not be entertained by, which even make us dangerous to existing institution—such call I good books.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
What a sense of security in an old book which time has criticized for us.
—James Russell Lowell (1819–91) American Poet, Critic
A multitude of books distracts the mind.
—Socrates (469BCE–399BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher
Literature has now become a game in which the booksellers are the kings; the critics, the knaves; the public, the pack; and the poor author, the mere table or thing played upon.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
Any historian of the literature of the modern age will take virtually for granted the adversary intention, the actually subversive intention, that characterizes modern writing—he will perceive its clear purpose of detaching the reader from the habits of thought and feeling that the larger culture imposes, of giving him a ground and a vantage point from which to judge and condemn, and perhaps revise, the culture that produces him.
—Lionel Trilling (1905–75) American Literary Critic
Be sure that you go to the author to get at his meaning, not to find yours.
—John Ruskin (1819–1900) English Writer, Art Critic
Only those things are beautiful which are inspired by madness and written by reason.
—Andre Gide (1869–1951) French Novelist
Remarks are not literature.
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946) American Writer
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