To know a man’s library is, in some measure, to know a man’s mind.

Reading was very important; the proper exercise and development of one’s mind was a paramount duty.

Of all books printed, probably not more than half are ever read. Many are embalmed in public libraries; many go into private quarters to fill spaces; many are glanced at and put away…scarcely opened until...

All good and true book-lovers practice the pleasing and improving avocation of reading in bed … No book can be appreciated until it has been slept with and dreamed over.

…we can pretend that the book in question is not Mr. West’s but mine, made mine by the madness of my reading.

Times change and discoveries are made that render earlier techniques and approaches less effective. Change is inevitable. To remain rigid when the whole world is changing and advancing is to invite misfortune. The AA program...

What’d you need?””Desuetude.””Reading again, are we? Could be dangerous. It means to become unaccustomed to. As in something gets discontinued, falls into disuse.””Thanks, man.””That it?””Yeah, but we should grab a drink sometime.

I was too much of a Bronx kid to read Emerson or Hawthorne.

When we are connected to the source, we will not be afraid of any task set before us.

Don’t just float through life; don’t just agree to anything and everything, have a course you are known for at all times.

Literature is news that stays news.

There are adventures of the spirit and one can travel in books and interest oneself in people and affairs. One need never be dull as long as one has friends to help, gardens to enjoy...

When I get hold of a book I particularly admire, I am so enthusiastic that I loan it to someone who never brings it back.

Something must always remain that eludes us … For power to have an object on which it can be exercised, a space in which to stretch out its arms … As long as I know...

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.

He didn’t much like reading novels – he preferred history or philosophy – or poetry, although he could read only a little poetry at a time, because when a poem “spoke to him” it was...

The Cat In The Hat,” I won’t need to protect my sensitive lips anymore.

Jacksonville has more public libraries than people who know how to read.

No man can be called friendless who has God and the companionship of good books.

What was a book? Not just ink and fiber and stitchery: a series of processes. To a wizard, it was not a static object–but a human thought caught and bound, made concrete through sacred technology....

My father never put a book into my hands and never forbade a book. Instead, he let me roam and graze, making my own more or less appropriate selections. I read gory tales of historic...

She had forced herself to learn to read – picked up bits and pieces, here and there, from the very few teachers who had been patient with her; from looking at words while out and...

The progress of the friendship between Catherine and Isabella was quick as its beginning had been warm…and if a rainy morning deprived them of other enjoyments, they were still resolute in meeting in defiance of...

There is something wonderful about a book. We can pick it up. We can heft it. We can read it. We can set it down. We can think of what we have read. It does...

In his library he had been always sure of leisure and tranquility; and though prepared, as he told Elizabeth, to meet with folly and conceit in every other room in the house, he was used...

Can you think of a better way to tell?

Our library isn’t very extensive,” said Anne, “but every book in it is a friend. We’ve picked our books up through the years, here and there, never buying one until we had first read it...

It’s very difficult for a black man to get out of South-Central Los Angeles, and get out civilized….The only men I know who have escaped, all began reading Robert Heinlein at age ten.

Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.

Discovery a good book is like finding a great treasure.

If you write without reading, you will certainly have too many books without readers.

My first addiction was to books. -B. Chelsea Adams

Keep anyone with whom you can read in silence.

He read because it gave him instant gratification in a way nothing else did,and as was the case with all addicts,gratification was the important thing.

Once I finished reading a good book, it gives me a hard time coping up with reality.

I don’t mind nothing happening in a book, but nothing happening in a phony way–characters saying things people never say, doing jobs that don’t fit, the whole works–is simply asking too much of a reader....

Love for books,love for wisdom.

In reading we must become creators.

Life must not be a novel that is given to us, but one that is made by us.

I shall keep my book on the table here, and read a little every morning as soon as I wake, for I know it will do me good, and help me through the day.

If you’ve ever read one of those articles that asks notable people to list their favorite books, you may have been impressed or daunted to see them pick Proust or Thomas Mann or James Joyce....

Authors: The only people you thank for leaving you emotionally devastated.

There are perhaps no days of our childhood we lived so fully as those we believe we left without having lived them, those we spent with a favorite book.

From the cave to the skyscraper, from the club to weapons of mass destruction, from the tautological life of the tribe to the era of globalization, the fictions of literature have multiplied human experiences, preventing...

Why does everyone think a girl who prefers books to people must be in want of a life?

A book is an arrangement of twenty-six phonetic symbols, ten numerals, and about eight punctuation marks, and people can cast their eyes over these and envision the eruption of Mount Vesuvius or the Battle of...

Digressions, incontestably, are the sunshine, the life, the soul of reading! Take them out and one cold eternal winter would reign in every page. Restore them to the writer – he steps forth like a...

We are of opinion that instead of letting books grow moldy behind an iron grating, far from the vulgar gaze, it is better to let them wear out by being read.

Language is a door. Words en-trance and are an entrance; they draw you in. When you read, the book you cradle disappears and the tales within unfold in your mind. Writing is a shelter of...

You should never read just for “enjoyment.” Read to make yourself smarter! Less judgmental. More apt to understand your friends’ insane behavior, or better yet, your own. Pick “hard books.” Ones you have to concentrate...