READING QUOTES V

quotations about reading

A book is a gift you can open again and again.

GARRISON KEILLOR

attributed, The Miracle of Language

Tags: Garrison Keillor


One can read all one wants, and spend eternities in front of a blackboard with a tutor, but one is not going to learn to swim until one gets in the water.

DAVID MAMET

True and False

Tags: David Mamet


Reading makes a full Man, Meditation a profound Man, Discourse a clear Man.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

Poor Richard's Almanac

Tags: Benjamin Franklin


Much reading, like a too great repletion, stops up, through a course of diverse sometimes contrary opinions, the access of a nearer, newer, and quicker invention of your own.

LAUGHTON OSBORN

attributed, Day's Collacon


Reading is thinking with some one else's head instead of one's own.

ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

"On Thinking for Oneself", Parerga und Paralipomena


I love to lose myself in other men's minds.

CHARLES LAMB

"Detached Thoughts on Books and Reading", Last Essays of Elia

Tags: Charles Lamb


The more imagination the reader has ... the more he will do for himself. He will, at a mere hint from the author, flood wretched material with suggestion and never guess that he is himself chiefly making what he enjoys.

C. S. LEWIS

"On Stories", Of Other Worlds: Essays and Stories

Tags: C. S. Lewis


Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul. When writers make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy is restored. We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again. It's like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can't stop the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship.

ANNE LAMOTT

Bird by Bird

Tags: Anne Lamott


A peasant that reads is a prince in waiting.

WALTER MOSLEY

The Long Fall

Tags: Walter Mosley


If we encountered a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he read.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

Letters and Social Aims

Tags: Ralph Waldo Emerson


There are some who say that sitting at home reading is the equivalent of travel, because the experiences described in the book are more or less the same as the experiences one might have on a voyage, and there are those who say that there is no substitute for venturing out into the world. My own opinion is that it is best to travel extensively but to read the entire time, hardly glancing up to look out of the window of the airplane, train, or hired camel.

DANIEL HANDLER

as Lemony Snicket, Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid

Tags: Daniel Handler


If we were more careful not to teach our children to read in their childhood we should not be so anxious about the effects of pernicious literature upon their adolescent morals.

JOHN KENDRICK BANGS

The Autobiography of Methuselah

Tags: John Kendrick Bangs


Why can't people just sit and read books and be nice to each other?

DAVID BALDACCI

The Camel Club

Tags: David Baldacci


We have not read an author till we have seen his object, whatever it may be, as he saw it.

THOMAS CARLYLE

Essays


And better had they ne'er been born,
Who read to doubt, or read to scorn.

WALTER SCOTT

The Monastery

Tags: Walter Scott


I will read anything rather than work.

JEAN KERR

introduction, Please Don't Eat the Daisies

Tags: Jean Kerr


The sagacious reader who is capable of reading between these lines what does not stand written in them, but is nevertheless implied, will be able to form some conception.

JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE

Autobiography

Tags: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe


When we read, we are not looking for new ideas, but to see our own thoughts given the seal of confirmation on the printed page. The words that strike us are those that awake an echo in a zone we have already made our own--the place where we live--and the vibration enables us to find fresh starting points within ourselves.

CESARE PAVESE

This Business of Living

Tags: Cesare Pavese


When, after having read a work, loftier thoughts arise in your mind and noble and heartfelt feelings animate you, do not look for any other rule to judge it by; it is fine and written in a masterly manner.

JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE

"Of Works of the Mind", Les Caractères

Tags: Jean de La Bruyère


The whole point of straws, I had thought, was that you did not have to set down the slice of pizza to suck a dose of Coke while reading a paperback.

NICHOLSON BAKER

The Mezzanine

Tags: Nicholson Baker