Imaginative readers rewrite books to suit their own taste, omitting and mentally altering what they read. Robert Graves, The Reader Over Your Shoulder, 1947
There were pools of light among the stacks, directly beneath the bulbs which Philip had switched on, but it was now with an unexpected fearfulness that he saw how the books stretched away into the darkness. They seemed to expand as soon as they reached the shadows, creating some dark world where there was no beginning and no end, no story, no meaning. And if you crossed the threshold into that world, you would be surrounded by words; you would crush them beneath your feet, you would knock against them with your head and arms, but if you tried to grasp them they would melt away. Philip did not dare turn his back upon these books. Not yet. It was almost, he thought, as if they had been speaking to each other while he slept. Peter Ackroyd
As soon as he entered the shop Charles could smell the moth-scented covering of the old folios and quartos; it was the dust of learning he inhaled, delicious in its speciality. There was a wooden counter around two sides of the room, upon which were laid out manuscripts, unbound sheets and parchment rolls. On the shelves he could see the collected works of Drayton, Drummond of Hawthornden and Cowley. Peter Ackroyd, The Lambs of London p15
So we may use our books to form a barricade against the world, interweaving their words with our own to ward off the heat of the day. Peter Ackroyd, English Music
Melvyn Bragg: Jeffrey Archer, one school of thought alleges your books suffer from being ... crap. Spitting Image s2e4
We have to translate your books into English. Spitting Image s4e2, son of Archer to Archer, ITV 1985
Have you actually read any of the books behind you? … Mr Kinnock, have you in fact ever read a book in your life? Spitting Image s10e3, Waldon interviewing Kinnock
What ... is a text course? One that uses books, of course ... You remember books? They’re what we used to read before we started discussing what we ought to read. Amanda Cross, Poetic Justice, 1970
The proper study of mankind is books. Aldous Huxley, Crome Yellow, 1921
Each country Book-club bows the knee to Baal,
And, hurling lawful Genius from the throne,
Erects a shrine and idol of its own. Lord Byron
Who cares! I haven’t read many books, but I’ve read all the ones that count. I know by heart the works of the four greatest poets of all time – Rumi, Iqbal, Miraz Ghalib, and a fourth fellow whose name I forget. I am a self-taught entrepreneur. Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger p6
A giant pile of old books lay in the centre of the market, arranged in a large, hollow square ... A small man sat cross-legged on a stack of magazines in the centre of the square of books, like the priest in charge of this mandala of print. The books drew me towards them like a big magnet, but as soon as he saw me, the man sitting on the magazines snapped, ‘All the books are in English.’ ibid. p205
So I stood around that big square of books. Standing around books, even books in a foreign language, you feel a kind of electricity buzzing up toward you, Your Excellency. It just happens, the way you get erect around girls wearing tight jeans. ibid.
Strange thoughts brew in your heart when you spend too much time with old books. ibid.
Have you read any good books lately? Richard Murdoch, BBC radio series
So many books, so little time. Frank Zappa
I cannot live without books. Thomas Jefferson
I am mortified to be told that in the United States of America the sale of a book can become a subject of enquiry, and of criminal enquiry too. Thomas Jefferson
Books are the perfect entertainment: no commercials, no batteries, hours of enjoyment for each dollar spent. What I wonder is why everybody doesn’t carry a book around for those inevitable dead spots in life. Stephen King
Speaking personally, you can have my gun, but you’ll take my book when you pry my cold, dead fingers off of the binding. Stephen King
Books should go where they will be most appreciated, and not sit unread, gathering dust on a forgotten shelf, don’t you agree? Christopher Paolini
And on the subject of burning books: I want to congratulate librarians, not famous for their physical strength or their powerful political connections or their great wealth, who, all over this country, have staunchly resisted anti-democratic bullies who have tried to remove certain books from their shelves, and have refused to reveal to thought police the names of persons who have checked out those titles.
So the America I loved still exists, if not in the White House or the Supreme Court or the Senate or the House of Representatives or the media. The America I love still exists at the front desks of our public libraries. Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country
I am eternally grateful for my knack of finding in great books, some of them very funny books, reason enough to feel honored to be alive, no matter what else might be going on. Kurt Vonnegut, Timequake
My Best Friend is a person who will give me a book I have not read. Abraham Lincoln
There are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts. Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist
I don’t believe in the kind of magic in my books. But I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a good book. J K Rowling
Everything in the world exists in order to end up as a book. Stephane Mallarme
A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author. G K Chesterton, Heretics
I am a product ... [of] endless books. My father bought all the books he read and never got rid of any of them. There were books in the study, books in the drawing room, books in the cloakroom, books (two deep) in the great bookcase on the landing, books in a bedroom, books piled as high as my shoulder in the cistern attic, books of all kinds reflecting every transient stage of my parents’ interest, books readable and unreadable, books suitable for a child and books most emphatically not. Nothing was forbidden me. In the seemingly endless rainy afternoons I took volume after volume from the shelves. I had always the same certainty of finding a book that was new to me as a man who walks into a field has of finding a new blade of grass. C S Lewis
Books are a poor substitute for female companionship, but they are easier to find. Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man's Fear
Books were safer than other people anyway. Neil Gaiman, The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Give me books, French wine, fruit, fine weather and a little music played out of doors by somebody I do not know. John Keats
Everybody does have a book in them, but in most cases that’s where it should stay. Christopher Hitchens
It wasn’t until I started reading and found books they wouldn’t let us read in school that I discovered you could be insane and happy and have a good life without being like everybody else. John Waters
If you cannot read all your books ... fondle them – peer into them, let them fall open where they will, read from the first sentence that arrests the eye, set them back on the shelves with your own hands, arrange them on your own plan so that you at least know where they are. Let them be your friends; let them, at any rate, be your acquaintances. Winston Churchill
Of course I loved books more than people. Diane Setterfield, The Thirteenth Tale
She should have done science, not spent all her time with her head in novels. Novels gave you a completely false idea about life, they told lies and they implied there were endings when in reality there were no endings, everything just went on and on and on. Kate Atkinson, Case Histories
Never lend books, for no one ever returns them; the only books I have in my library are books that other folks have lent me. Anatole France