Book Quotes - Page 40

I remember a lot of dreams. Sometimes they are hard to distinguish from what has really happened. That is not so terrible. It is the same with books.

I don't care who writes a nation's laws - or crafts its advanced treaties - if I can write its economics textbooks.

A library is a temple unabridged with priceless treasure. Librarians are the majesties who loan the jewels of measure. They welcome to the kingdom the young and old of reapers and reign among the riches as the wondrous fortune keepers.

The public is wonderfully tolerant. It forgives everything except genius.

I'm gonna ask you one more time, will you or will you not go out with me? I think my hand's slipping.

All books are judged by their covers until they are read.

If peace had a smell,it would be the smell of a library full of old, leather-bound books.

I firmly believe every book was meant to be written.

So I kept reading, just to stay alive. In fact, I'd read two or three books at the same time, so I wouldn't finish one without being in the middle of another -- anything to stop me from falling into the big, gaping void. You see, books fill the empty spaces. If I'm waiting for a bus, or am eating alone, I can always rely on a book to keep me company. Sometimes I think I like them even more than people. People will let you down in life. They'll disappoint you and hurt you and betray you. But not books. They're better than life.

It was a house for those who could not take care of themselves, for those who heard voices, who had strange thoughts and did strange things. The house was meant to keep them in. Once they came, they never left.

I want to do something splendid… Something heroic or wonderful that won’t be forgotten after I’m dead… I think I shall write books.

The thing about me and books is that whichever one I’m reading always reminds me of whatever’s happening in my life during that time.

Buying a book is not about obtaining a possession, but about securing a portal.

There's a serendipity to real life that the Internet can't duplicate. Do you use the library? For anything? Well, sometimes you end up picking up the book next to the one you were looking for, and it's that book that changes your life.

Choosing a new book was like looking for treasure.

There'll be times when the only refuge is books. Then you'll read as if you meant it, as if your life depended on it.

Books are the best friends you can have; they inform you, and entertain you, and they don't talk back.

Keep a diary, but don't just list all the things you did during the day. Pick one incident and write it up as a brief vignette. Give it color, include quotes and dialogue, shape it like a story with a beginning, middle and end—as if it were a short story or an episode in a novel. It's great practice. Do this while figuring out what you want to write a book about. The book may even emerge from within this running diary.

A book is actually a place, a place where we, as adults, still have the chance to engage in active imagining, translating word to image, connecting these images to memories, dreams, and larger ideas. Television, film, even the stage play, have already been imagined for us, but the book, in whatever form we choose to interact with it, forces us to complete it.

Libraries really are wonderful. They're better than bookshops, even. I mean bookshops make a profit on selling you books, but libraries just sit there lending you books quietly out of the goodness of their hearts.

The main thing I wanted to say, and thankfully it’s what most people say they get out of the book, is simply an acknowledgement that we do affect each other in ways we can’t predict.

A civilization without retail bookstores is unimaginable. Like shrines and other sacred meeting places, bookstores are essential artifacts of human nature. The feel of a book taken from the shelf and held in the hand is a magical experience, linking writer to reader.

Books are a staircase to unknown worlds.

To make sure that my blasphemy is thoroughly expressed, I hereby state my opinion that the notion of a god is a basic superstition, that there is no evidence for the existence of any god(s), that devils, demons, angels and saints are myths, that there is no life after death, heaven nor hell, that the Pope is a dangerous, bigoted, medieval dinosaur, and that the Holy Ghost is a comic-book character worthy of laughter and derision.

Writer's block is real. It happens. Some days you sit down at the old typewriter, put your fingers on the keys, and nothing pops into your head. Blanko. Nada. El nothingissimo. What you do when this happens is what separates you from the one-of-thesedays- I'm-gonna-write-a-book crowd.