Books
Quotes - Maybe Heaven will be a library
“People
talk about books being an escape, but here on the tube, this one feels more
like a lifeline...The motion of the train makes her head rattle, but her eyes
lock on the words the way a figure skater might choose a focal point as she
spins, and just like that, she's grounded again.”
―
Jennifer E. Smith, The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight
“No
book can ever be finished. While working on it we learn just enough to find it
immature the moment we turn away from it”
―
Karl Popper
“There
are essentially two things that will make you wise -- the books you read and
the people you meet.”
―
Jack Canfield
“All
writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives
there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a
long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if
one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor
understand. For all one knows that demon is simply the same instinct that makes
a baby squall for attention. And yet it is also true that one can write nothing
readable unless one constantly struggles to efface one's own personality. Good
prose is like a windowpane.”
―
George Orwell, Why I Write
“I
still remember the day my father took me to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books for
the first time.”
―
Carlos Ruiz Zafon, The Shadow of the Wind
“How
does it feel, anyway?"
How
does what feel?"
When
you take one of those books?"
At
that moment, she chose to keep still. If he wants an answer, he'd have to come
back, and he did. "Well?" he asked, but again, it was the boy who
replied, before Liesel could even open her mouth.
It
feels good, doesn't it? To steal something back.”
―
Markus Zusak, The Book Thief
“There
are many horrible sights in the multiverse. Somehow, though, to a soul attuned
to the subtle rhythms of a library, there are few worse sights than a hole
where a book ought to be.”
―
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
“A
story is alive, as you and I are. It is rounded by muscle and sinew. Rushed
with blood. Layered with skin, both rough and smooth. At its core lies soft
marrow of hard, white bone. A story beats with the heart of every person who
has ever strained ears to listen. On the breath of the storyteller, it soars.
Until its images and deeds become so real you can see them in the air,
shimmering like oases on the horizon line. A story can fly like a bee, so
straight and swift you catch only the hum of its passing. Or move so slowly it
seems motionless, curled in upon itself like a snake in the sun. It can vanish
like smoke before the wind. Linger like perfume in the nose. Change with every
telling, yet always remain the same.”
―
Cameron Dokey
“She
did not care very much for other little girls, but if she had plenty of books
she could console herself.”
―
Frances Hodgson Burnett, A Little Princess
“The
book smelled dusty and old but also carried a sweet tang, a hint of something
inviting. She opened to the first page and started to read, pronouncing the
words in a reverent whisper.”
―
Shannon Hale
“Maybe
Heaven will be a library. Then I will be able to finish my to-read list.”
―
Kellie Elmore
“I
read the fuck out of every book I can get my hands on.”
―
Nick Hornby, A Long Way Down
“Break
the spine of one of my books and I break yours.”
―
Mia James, By Midnight
“Censorship
ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except
the books that nobody can read."
[As
quoted in Literary Censorship in England (in Current Opinion, Vol. 55, No. 5,
November 1913)]”
―
George Bernard Shaw
“What
an author doesn't know could fill a book.”
―
Holly Black, Lucinda's Secret
“The
old man was peering intently at the shelves. 'I'll have to admit that he's a
very competent scholar.'
Isn't
he just a librarian?' Garion asked, 'somebody who looks after books?'
That's
where all the rest of scholarship starts, Garion. All the books in the world
won't help you if they're just piled up in a heap.”
―
David Eddings, King of the Murgos
“A
book is the only place in which you can examine a fragile thought without
breaking it, or explore an explosive idea without fear it will go off in your
face. It is one of the few havens remaining where a man's mind can get both
provocation and privacy.”
―
Edward P. Morgan
“One
glance at (a book) and you hear the voice of another person - perhaps someone
dead for thousands of years. Across the millenia, the author is speaking,
clearly and silently, inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the
greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant
epochs, who never knew one another. Books break the shackles of time.”
―
Carl Sagan, Cosmos
“Never
trust anyone who has not brought a book with them”
―
Lemony Snicket, Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid
“What
art offers is space – a certain breathing room for the spirit.”
―
John Updike
