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7310826 His voice had a faint trace of an accent she couldn't place - one that made her pretty sure he was no local kid infected the night before. books dark gavriel holly-black literature paranormal paranormal-romance romance tana-bach the-coldest-girl-in-coldtown vampires ya Holly Black
82a90a4 Every word spoken in the past accumulated forms and colors in the self. What flows through the veins besides blood is the distillation of every act committed, the sediment of all the visions, wishes, dreams and experiences. All the past emotions converge to tint the skin and flavor the lips, to regulate the pulse and produce crystals in the eyes. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
594b7fb Love the great narcotic was the revealer in the alchemist's bottle rendering visible the most untraceable substances. Love the great narcotic was the agent provocateur exposing all the secret selves to daylight. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
97e3315 "I guess if there's one thing I can say about the 21st century, it's that the 21st century is all flash and no substance... everything is digital, nothing but files of invisible electronic data on computers and mindless zombies on their cellular phones... it's sad how because of the digital age, society is ultimately doomed. Nothing in the digital age is real anymore, and you know, they say celluloid film and ray tube televisions and maybe even paper might become obsolete in this century? ...What's most annoying is that nobody cares, they've just learned to accept the digital age and get addicted to it... none of them are ever going to step up and say to the world, "you're all a bunch of sheep!" and even if they did say anything, I doubt anyone would listen... they're all too obsessed and attached to their cellular phones and overly big televisions and whatever other moronic things they've got these days... it almost makes me want an apocalypse to happen, to erase digital technology and force the world to start over again." apocalypse bleak book books camera cell-phones celluloid depressingly-honest digital doom film future paper photography poison scary super-8 Rebecca McNutt
12c31ba No one stepping for the first time into a room made of books can know instinctively how to behave, what is expected, what is promised, what is allowed. One may be overcome by horror--at the cluster or the vastness, the stillness, the mocking reminder of everything one doesn't know, the surveillance--and some of that overwhelming feeling may cling on, even after the rituals and conventions are learned, the geography mapped, and the natives found friendly. books libraries library Alberto Manguel
2b31f00 I don't know anyone who can't learn something from The Little Prince. books le-petit-prince the-little-prince Veronica Henry
cf69bea One of the smartest things one can do in life sometimes...is play stupid. Be encouraged authors best-quote-ever book-clubs books bookstores encouragement face-book-quotes inspirational-quotes kerry-e-wagner oprah-winfrey-favorite-quote perspectives quotes steve-harvey twitter-quotes tyler-perry Kerry E. Wagner
ef6ce4d Just because you start attempting to do right, doesn't mean people will let you forget about what you've done wrong...Be encouraged authors best-quote-ever book-clubs books bookstores encouragement face-book-quotes inspirational-quotes kerry-e-wagner oprah-winfrey-favorite-quote perspectives quotes steve-harvey twitter-quotes tyler-perry Kerry E. Wagner
53753bb "Having to amuse myself during those earlier years, I read voraciously and widely. Mythic matter and folklore made up much of that reading--retellings of the old stories ( ), anecdotal collections and historical investigations of the stories' backgrounds--and then I stumbled upon the books which took me back to and the like. I was in heaven when began the Unicorn imprint for Ballantine and scoured the other publishers for similar good finds, delighting when I discovered someone like , who still remains a favourite. This was before there was such a thing as a fantasy genre, when you'd be lucky to have one fantasy book published in a month, little say the hundreds per year we have now. I also found myself reading (the Cormac and Bran mac Morn books were my favourites), and finally started reading science fiction after coming across 's Huon of the Horn. That book wasn't sf, but when I went to read more by her, I discovered everything else was. So I tried a few and that led me to and any number of other fine sf writers. These days my reading tastes remain eclectic, as you might know if you've been following my monthly book review column in . I'm as likely to read as as as book-genres books fantasy influences reading recommendations sci-fi science-fiction sf Charles de Lint
e517f7b "On my website there's a quote from the writer Anthony Burgess: "The greatest gift is the passion for reading. It is cheap, it consoles, it distracts, it excites, it gives you knowledge of the world and experience of a wide kind." I've always found that inspiring because the written word, as an art form, is unlike any other: movies, TV, music, they're shared experiences, but books aren't like that. The relationship between a writer and a reader is utterly unique to those two individuals. The world that forms in your head as you read a book will be slightly different to that experienced by every other reader. Anywhere. Ever. Reading is very personal, a communication from one mind to another, something which can't be exactly copied, or replicated, or directly shared. books inspiration inspirational novel novelist reading writing written-word Simon Cheshire
3ffef69 Madem kimileri iyi insan olmayi seciyor, madem bundan haz aliyorlar, onlara hayatta karismam, kimse de bana karismasin. Ama bana karisiyorlardi. Ustelik kotuluk bireye ozgudur, sizlere, bana ve tek tabancaligimiza ozgudur ve bizleri yaratan bizim Tanri'dir, hem de gururla ve keyifle yaratmistir. Ama birey olmayan seyler kotuluge katlanamazlar, yani devlet ve yargiclar ve okullar kotuluge izin vermezler cunku bireylere izin veremezler. Hem modern tarihimiz, bu buyuk makinelerle savasan cesur, kucuk bireylerin oykusu degil midir kardeslerim? Bu konuda ciddiyim kardeslerim. Ama yaptiklarimi sevdigim icin yapiyorum. anthony-burgess books quotes-about-life Anthony Burgess
f896dac And he read all morning, but just to make it interesting, he put lots of dragons in it. books dragons interest reading Terry Pratchett
5f67f23 "Prayer seems to me a cry of weakness, and an attempt to avoid, by trickery, the rules of the game as laid down. I do not choose to admit weakness. I accept the challenge of responsibility. Life, as it is, does not frighten me, since I have made my peace with the universe as I find it, and bow to its laws. The ever-sleepless sea in its bed, crying out "how long?" to Time; million-formed and never motionless flame; the contemplation of these two aspects alone, affords me sufficient food for ten spans of my expected lifetime. It seems to me that organized creeds are collections of words around a wish. I feel no need for such. However, I would not, by word or deed, attempt to deprive another of the consolation it affords. It is simply not for me. Somebody else may have my rapturous glance at the archangels. The springing of the yellow line of morning out of the misty deep of dawn, is glory enough for me. I know that nothing is destructible; things merely change forms. When the consciousness we know as life ceases, I know that I shall still be part and parcel of the world. I was a part before the sun rolled into shape and burst forth in the glory of change. I was, when the earth was hurled out from its fiery rim. I shall return with the earth to Father Sun, and still exist in substance when the sun has lost its fire, and disintegrated into infinity to perhaps become a part of the whirling rubble of space. Why fear? The stuff of my being is matter, ever changing, ever moving, but never lost; so what need of denominations and creeds to deny myself the comfort of all my fellow men? The wide belt of the universe has no need for finger-rings. I am one with the infinite and need no other assurance." books inspirational quotes rational religion Zora Neale Hurston
12e277f Edward genially enough did not agree with what I said, but he didn't seem to admit my point, either. I wanted to press him harder so I veered close enough to the to point out that his life--the life of the mind, the life of the book collector and music lover and indeed of the gallery-goer, appreciator of the feminine and occasional --would become simply unlivable and unthinkable in an Islamic republic. Again, he could accede politely to my point but carry on somehow as if nothing had been conceded. I came slowly to realize that with Edward, too, I was keeping two sets of books. We agreed on things like the first Palestinian , another event that took the Western press completely off guard, and we collaborated on a book of essays that asserted and defended Palestinian rights. This was in the now hard-to-remember time when all official recognition was withheld from the PLO. Together we debated Professor Bernard Lewis and Leon Wieseltier at a once-celebrated conference of the Middle East Studies Association in Cambridge in 1986, tossing and goring them somewhat in a duel over academic 'objectivity' in the wider discipline. But even then I was indistinctly aware that Edward didn't feel himself quite at liberty to say certain things, while at the same time feeling rather too much obliged to say certain other things. A low point was an almost uncritical profile of Yasser Arafat that he contributed to magazine in the late 1980s. 1986 ad-hominem arafat art bernard-lewis books cambridge debate edward-said feminism first-intifada intellectualism interview-magazine intifada islamic-republic israeli-palestinian-conflict leon-wieseltier middle-east middle-eastern-studies music palestine palestinians theocracy Christopher Hitchens
e070b1b "I look over at my hero shelf and see Philip Levine, Rainer Maria Rilke, Virginia Woolf, Shunryu Suzuki, Adrienne Rich, Pablo Neruda, Subcomandante Marcos, Eduardo Galeano, James Baldwin. These books are, if they are instructions at all, instructions in extending our identities out into the world, human and nonhuman, in imagination as a great act of empathy that lifts you out of yourself, not locks you down into your gender. ("80 Books No Woman Should Read")" books stories Rebecca Solnit
9d30757 She was spoiled, but she wasn't lazy. She knew what she wanted, and because she believed absolutely that she could have everything she wanted if she tried hard enough to get it, she never stopped trying. book books friends friendship fun funny gossip-girl happy knowledge life love quote quotes strength woman Cecily von Ziegesar
7718289 please,Tana,please.' -lots of characters in The Coldest Girl in Coldtown books dark gavriel holly-black literature paranormal paranormal-romance romance tana-bach the-coldest-girl-in-coldtown vampires ya Holly Black
b6e0003 And it is that which draws me to you, too, for you are the tropics, you have the sun in you, and the softness and the clarity... book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
7f5a3f8 The magic beauty of simultaneity, to see the loved one rushing toward you at the same moment you are rushing toward him, the magic power of meeting, exactly at midnight to achieve union, the illusion of one common rhythm achieved by overcoming obstacles, deserting friends, breaking other bonds - all this was soon dissolved by his laziness, by his habit of missing every moment, of never keeping his word, of living perversely in a state of chaos, of swimming more naturally in a sea of failed intentions, broken promises, and aborted wishes book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
a870820 When you're in my arms, I know you're mine. But your feet are so swift, so swift, they carry you as lightly as wings, I never know where, too fast, too fast away from me. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
79a2138 The potion drunk by lovers is prepared by no one but themselves. The potion is the sum of one's whole existence. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
8cf34c9 So many broken promises, each day an aborted wish, a lost object, a misplaced unread book, cluttering the room like an attic with discarded possessions. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
8a7fee9 ...books provided much-needed ballast - something we both craved, amid the chaos and upheaval... books Will Schwalbe
a275d9b His entire body was pleading for reassurance, and if her whole love was not enough what else could she give him to cure his doubt? book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
8550afa This allowed her two glorious hours sitting quietly by herself in a cozy corner, devouring one book after another. When she had read every single children's book in the place, she started wandering round in search of something else. books matilda roald-dahl Roald Dahl
f931067 Every article and review and book that I have ever published has constituted an appeal to the person or persons to whom I should have talked before I dared to write it. I never launch any little essay without the hope--and the fear, because the encounter may also be embarrassing--that I shall draw a letter that begins, 'Dear Mr. Hitchens, it seems that you are unaware that...' It is in this sense that authorship is collaborative with 'the reader.' And there's no help for it: you only find out what you ought to have known by pretending to know at least some of it already. It doesn't matter how obscure or arcane or esoteric your place of publication may be: some sweet law ensures that the person who should be scrutinizing your work eventually does do so. authorship book-reviews books collaboration essays readers writers writing Christopher Hitchens
87c88e0 I do not think that there can ever be enough books about anything; and I say that knowing that some of them are going to be about Pilates. books writing Sarah Vowell
15bc020 The world rushed in a circle and turned on its axis and time was busy burning the years and the people anyway, without any help from him. So if he burnt things with the firemen and the sun burnt Time, that meant that everything burnt! One of them had to stop burning. The sun wouldn't, certainly. So it looked as if it had to be Montag and the people he had worked with until a few short hours ago. Somewhere the saving and putting away had to begin again and someone had to do the saving and keeping, one way or another, in books, in records, in people's heads, any way at all so long as it was safe, free from moths, silverfish, rust and dry-rot, and men with matches. books preservation records time transience Ray Bradbury
2aad391 Benim icin kitap okurken hala onemli olan anlamaktan cok, okudugum seye uygun dusler kurmaktir. books kitap kitaplar okumak reading Orhan Pamuk
1b2f626 In this instant of danger they realized they were each other's reason for living, and into this instant they threw their whole being. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
5590729 "Every lover could be brought to trial as the murderer of his own love. When something hurts you, saddens you, I rush to avoid it, to alter it, to feel as you do, but you turn away with a gesture of impatience and say: "I don't understand" book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
d37958a I was sixteen and my mother was about to throw me out of the house forever, for breaking a very big rule, even bigger than the forbidden books. The rule was not just No Sex, but definitely No Sex With Your Own Sex. books books-express sex sexuality winterson Jeanette Winterson
f55046d Academic masochism reflects a metaphysical prejudice that the truth should be a hard-won treasure, that what is read or learnt easily must therefore be flighty and inconsequential. The truth should be like a mount to be scaled, it is dangerous, obscure and demanding. Under the light of the library reading room, the academics' motto reads: the more a text makes me suffer, the truer it must be. books love truth Alain de Botton
853ad3b George, if you ever break the spine of one of my books, I want you to know that you might as well be breaking my own spine. books Anne Fadiman
3bbdc15 Thus, in a real sense, I am constantly writing autobiography, but I have to turn it into fiction in order to give it credibility. books writing Katherine Paterson
62394ee But one learns from books and reels only that certain things can be done. Actual learning requires that you do those things. books education learning Frank Herbert
e805f2a The ceaseless rain is falling fast, And yonder gilded vane, Immovable for three days past, Points to the misty main, It drives me in upon myself And to the fireside gleams, To pleasant books that crowd my shelf, And still more pleasant dreams, I read whatever bards have sung Of lands beyond the sea, And the bright days when I was young Come thronging back to me. In fancy I can hear again The Alpine torrent's roar, The mule-bells on the hills of Spain, The sea at Elsinore. I see the convent's gleaming wall Rise from its groves of pine, And towers of old cathedrals tall, And castles by the Rhine. I journey on by park and spire, Beneath centennial trees, Through fields with poppies all on fire, And gleams of distant seas. I fear no more the dust and heat, No more I feel fatigue, While journeying with another's feet O'er many a lengthening league. Let others traverse sea and land, And toil through various climes, I turn the world round with my hand Reading these poets' rhymes. From them I learn whatever lies Beneath each changing zone, And see, when looking with their eyes, Better than with mine own. books rain reading traveling traveling-through-books travels-by-the-fireside weather Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
e376956 This is the strange life of books that you enter along as a writer, mapping an unknown territory that arises as you travel. If you succeed in the voyage, others enter after, one at a time, also alone, but in communion with your imagination, traversing your route. Books are solitudes where we meet. books readers reading writers writing Rebecca Solnit
df13fb4 One thinks of nothing,' he continued; 'the hours slip by. Motionless we traverse countries we fancy we see, and your thought, blinding with the fiction, playing with the details, follows the outline of the adventures. It mingles with the characters, and it seems as if it were yourself palpitating beneath their costumes. books emotions feelings madame-bovary reading Gustave Flaubert
6a0b8bb ...to her all books were the same and, as with her subjects, she felt a duty to approach them without prejudice...Lauren Bacall, Winifred Holtby, Sylvia Plath - who were they? Only be reading could she find out. books celebrities equality information knowledge learning prejudice reading Alan Bennett
2f3a6dc "I love the smell of old books," Mandy sighed, inhaling deeply with the book pressed against her face. The yellow pages smelled of wood and paper mills and mothballs." -- books dream mothballs nerd nostalgia old paper-mill reading smell smell-of-books surreal vintage wood Rebecca McNutt
59467c9 I never read prefaces, and it is not much good writing things just for people to skip. I wonder other authors have never thought of this. books E. Nesbit
1425b78 Hugh Laurie (playing Mr. Palmer) felt the line 'Don't palm all your abuses [of language upon me]' was possibly too rude. 'It's in the book,' I said. He didn't hit me. books jane-austen language movies screenplays writing Emma Thompson
40bd58b "My men are my references. They're waiting outside for the books. They're dangerous." "Men like that always are." books burn dangerous Ray Bradbury
bb766e6 "Truth is like the moon in the sky. Words are like a finger. A finger can point to the moon's location, but it is not the moon. To see the moon, you must look past the finger. To look for the truth in books, the Sixth Patriarch was saying, is like mistaking the finger for the moon. The moon and the finger are not the same thing. "Not same," old Jiko would have said. "Not different, either." books ruth-ozeki truths Ruth Ozeki
b85665b Just aiming a speely input device, or a Farspark chambre, or whatever you call it... a speelycaptor... at something doesn't collect what is meaningful to me. I need someone to gather it in with all their senses, mix it round in their head, and make it over into words. books media technology Neal Stephenson
b95bc32 How is a magician to exist without books? Let someone explain to me. It is like asking a politician to achieve high office without the benefit of bribes or patronage. 2004 books bribery corruption jonathan-strange magic patronage politicians Susanna Clarke
cbfc116 No man and woman know what will be born in the darkness of their intermingling; so much besides children, so many invisible births, exchanges of soul and character, blossoming of unknown selves, liberation of hidden treasures, buried fantasies... book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
4d750f6 ...books possess an ounce-of-weight to minute-of-entertainment ratio that compares quite favorably to intoxicants. books Jon Krakauer
7381d48 "Of all the ways of acquiring books, writing them oneself is regarded as the most praiseworthy method. -- Walter Benjamin, "Unpacking My Library" -- books creating library writers writing Phillip Lopate
72b81a4 I doubt if ever one ceases to love, but one can cease to be in love as easily as one can outgrow an author one admired as a boy. books doctor-fischer-of-geneva graham-greene love Graham Greene
4a09597 Roma tidaklah dibangun dalam waktu sehari. Begitu juga sebuah jalan kereta api. Atau hal-hal lain yang menyenangkan dalam hidup ini. - Charles Ingalls books romantis Laura Ingalls Wilder
a702efb We haven't remained idle, twiddling our thumbs while you were off having a good time. Through books Cathy and I have lived a zillion lives . . . our vicarious way to feel alive. abandonement alive away book-reading books children experience good-time idle live lived lives read reading thumbs vicarious V.C. Andrews
04cc68b Sitting in the brightly lit library, surrounded by books, in total silence, that was ma personal zenith. bookish books heroine introversion introvert irvine-welsh library literature read reader reading reading-books skagboys solitude zenith Irvine Welsh
a5358c5 It's commonplace to say that we 'love' a book, but when we say it, we mean all sorts of things. Sometimes we mean that a book was important to us in out youth, though we haven't picked it up in years; sometimes what we 'love' is an impressionistic idea glimpsed from afar (Combray...madeleins...Tante Leonie...) as apposed to the experience of wallowing and plowing through an actual text, and all too often people claim to love books they haven't read at all. Then there are books we love so much that we read every year or two, and know passages of them by heart; that cheer us up when we are sick or sad and never fail to amuse us when we take them up at random; that we pass on to all our friends and acquaintances; and to which we return again and again with undimmed enthusiasm over the course of a lifetime. I think it goes without saying ghat most books that engage readers on this very high levels are masterpieces; and this is why I believe that True Grit by Charles Portis is a masterpiece. books love love-books Donna Tartt
01b8a97 "Their conversation ceased abruptly with the entry of an oddly-shaped man whose body resembled a certain vegetable. He was a thickset fellow with calloused and jaundiced skin and a patch of brown hair, a frizzy upheaval. We will call him Bell Pepper. Bell Pepper sidled up beside The Drippy Man and looked at the grilled cheese in his hand. The Drippy Man, a bit uncomfortable at the heaviness of the gaze, politely apologized and asked Bell Pepper if he would like one. "Why is one of your legs fatter than the other?" asked Bell Pepper. The Drippy Man realized Bell Pepper was not looking at his sandwich but towards the inconsistency of his leg sizes. "You always get your kicks pointing out defects?" retorted The Drippy Man. "Just curious. Never seen anything like it before." "I was raised not to feel shame and hide my legs in baggy pants." "So you flaunt your deformity by wearing short shorts?" "Like you flaunt your pockmarks by not wearing a mask?" Bell Pepper backed away, kicking wide the screen door, making an exit to a porch over hanging a dune of sand that curved into a jagged upward jab of rock. "He is quite sensitive," commented The Dry Advisor. "Who is he?" "A fellow who once manipulated the money in your wallet but now curses the fellow who does." authors books conspiracy dubai dystopia dystopian-fiction economic-collapse economics end-of-the-world espionage future maine politics satire small-press spy-thriller writers writing Jeff Phillips
0a8f727 The fascination exerted by one human being over another is not what he emits of his personality at the present instant of encounter but a summation of his entire being which gives off this powerful drug capturing the fancy and attachment. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
643892f But love, the great narcotic, was the hothouse in which all the selves burst into their fullest bloom... book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
eddeec1 Ursula K. Le Guin urges authors to remember why they do what they do. Her argument is that writing is an form of art rather than a commodity. books writing Ursula K. Le Guin
a9887f4 It was a high ceilinged room with tall, large-panes windows. Apart from the doorway was the desk where book had been checked out in days when books were still being checked out. He stood there for a moment looking around the silent room, shaking his head slowly. All these books, he thought, the residue of a planet's intellect, the scrapings of futile minds, the leftovers, the potpourri of artifacts that had no power to save men from perishing. apocalypse books dead death decay empty library metaphor zombies Richard Matheson
26459a7 I am sure you would not understand if I told you my father is delightfully clear and selfish, tender and lying, formal and incurable. He exhausts all the loves given to him. If I did not leave his house at night to warm myself in Rango's burning hands I would die at my task, arid and barren, sapless, while my father monologues about his past, and I yawn yawn yawn... book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
df3776a "People with Books. What, in 2007, could be more incongruous than that? It makes me want to laugh." [ ]" books modern-life modern-society reading Michael Chabon
d67fe43 It wouldn't matter if he was a bad boy , if you got rid of your bad habit. Be encouraged authors best-quote-ever book-clubs books bookstores encouragement face-book-quotes inspirational-quotes kerry-e-wagner oprah-winfrey-favorite-quote perspectives quotes steve-harvey twitter-quotes tyler-perry Kerry E. Wagner
525ebf0 She felt something similar, but worse in a way, about hundreds and hundreds of books she'd read, novels, biographies, occasional books, about music and art--she could remember nothing about them at all, so that it seemed rather pointless even to say that she had read them; such claims were things people set great store by but she hardly supposed they recalled any more than she did. Sometimes a book persisted as a coloured shadow at the edge of sight, as vague and unrecapturable as something seen in the rain from a passing vehicle; looked at directly it vanished altogether. Sometimes there were atmospheres, even the rudiments of a scene; a man in an office looking over Regent's Park, rain in the street outside--a little blurred etching of a situation she would never, could never, trace back to its source in a novel she had read some time, she thought, in the past thirty years. books remembering what-s-the-name-of-that-book Alan Hollinghurst
8c15102 Le cose che voi cercate, Montag, sono su questa terra, ma il solo modo per cui l'uomo medio potra vederne il novantanove per cento sara un libro. books citazioni fahrenheit-451 italiano letteratura libri quotes Ray Bradbury
1649239 Now, his hair is white and he no longer understands anyone's need to love, for he has lost everything, not to love, but to his games of love; and when you love as a game, you lose everything, as he lost his home and wife, and now he clings to me, afraid of loss, afraid of solitude. book-quotes-book books Anaïs Nin
bcefdaa And did the distress I was feeling derive from some internal sickness of the soul, or was it imposed on me by the sickness of society? That someone besides me had suffered from these ambiguities and had seen light on their far side... that I could find company and consolation and hope in an object pulled almost at random from a bookshelf--felt akin to an instance of religious grace. books literature reading words Jonathan Franzen
d9aa55a I was hungry when I left Pyongyang. I wasn't hungry just for a bookshop that sold books that weren't about Fat Man and Little Boy. I wasn't ravenous just for a newspaper that had no pictures of F.M. and L.B. I wasn't starving just for a TV program or a piece of music or theater or cinema that wasn't cultist and hero-worshiping. I was . I got off the North Korean plane in Shenyang, one of the provincial capitals of Manchuria, and the airport buffet looked like a cornucopia. I fell on the food, only to find that I couldn't do it justice, because my stomach had shrunk. And as a foreign tourist in North Korea, under the care of vigilant minders who wanted me to see only the best, I had enjoyed the finest fare available. airports books cinema cults food hero-worship hunger kim-il-sung kim-jong-il literature manchuria music newspapers north-korea propaganda pyongyang shenyang television theatre totalitarianism tourism tourism-in-north-korea Christopher Hitchens
3940b17 Until then I had thought each book spoke of the things, human or divine, that lie outside books. Now I realized that not infrequently books speak of books: it is as if they spoke among themselves. In the light of this reflection, the library seemed all the more disturbing to me. It was then the place of a long, centuries -old murmuring, an imperceptible dialogue between one parchment and another, a living thing, a receptacle of powers not to be ruled by a human mind, a treasure of secrets emanated by many minds, surviving the death of those who had produced them or had been their conveyors. books dialogue dialogues-between-books libraries library parchment speaking Umberto Eco
c437da6 I used to get upset if somebody I didn't like loved a book I loved. That's MY book, I'd think. books humor Abigail Thomas
0f78c80 No moment of charm without long roots in the past, no moment of charm is born on bare soil, a careless accident of beauty, but is the sum of great sorrows, growths, and efforts. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
71db98c Ali Baba protects the lovers! Gives them the luck of bandits, and no guilt, for love fills certain people and expands them beyond all laws; there is no time, no place for regrets, hesitations, cowardices. Love runs free and reckless, and all the gentle trickeries perpetrated to protect others from its burns-those who are not the lovers but who might be the victims of this love's expansion. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
0c91fe2 Men from the mountains always dream of the sea, and above all things I love to travel. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
5bafcd7 Paul, Paul, this is the claim you never made, the fervor you never showed. You were so cool and light, so elusive, and I never felt you encircling me and claiming possession. Rango is saying all the words I wanted to hear you say. You never came close to me, even while taking me. You took me as men take foreign women in distant countries whose language they cannot speak. You took me in silence and strangeness. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
b0136fe Systematisches Lesen ist kaum von Nutzen. Offizielle Bucherlisten (der Klassiker, der Literaturgeschichte, der zensurierten oder empfohlenen Bucher, der Bibliothekskataloge) konnen per Zufall den einen oder anderen nutzlichen Hinweis geben. Die beste Anleitung bieten personliche Launen - das Vertrauen auf das Lustprinzip und der Glaube an den Zufall -, die uns manchmal in einen provisorischen Zustand der Gnade versetzen, uns ermoglichen, Gold aus Flachs zu spinnen. books reading Alberto Manguel
50a9483 Her presence had awakened in him a man suddenly whipped by his earlier ideals, whose lost manhood wanted to assert itself in action. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
fde2602 No privacy left. No manners. book-quotes books Anaïs Nin
65b0769 "Last night I thought about all that kerosene I've used in the past ten years. And I thought about books. And for the first time I realized that a man was behind each one of the books. A man had to think them up. A man had to take a long time to put them down on paper. And I'd never even thought that thought before." He got out of bed. "It took some man a lifetime maybe to put some of his thoughts down, looking around at the world and life and then I come along in two minutes and boom! it's all over." "Let me alone," said Mildred. "I didn't do anything." "Let you alone! That's all very well, but how can I leave myself alone? We need not to be let alone. We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were bothered? About something important, about something real?" books bother create creation creativity destruction ignorance important kerosene life lifetime observation real reality reality-check thought time work world Ray Bradbury
f6e4310 Whether the underlying cause of your dependency is a chemical imbalance, unresolved events from the past, beliefs you hold that are inconsistent with what is true, an inability to cope with current conditions, or a combination of these four causes, know this: not only are all the causes of dependency within you, but all the solutions are within you as well. addiction-cure addiction-treatment-center alcohol-abuse alcohol-rehab author books chris-prentiss depression drug-abuse drug-rehab holistic-health holistic-treatment los-angeles-rehab malibu-rehab passages-malibu passages-ventura quotes rehab-center substance-abuse writer writing Chris Prentiss
e1456ef "...there is a saying used in twelve-step programs and in most treatment centers that "Relapse is part of recovery." It's another dangerous slogan that is based on a myth, and it only gives people permission to relapse because that think that when they do, they are on the road to recovery." addiction-cure addiction-treatment addiction-treatment-center alcohol-abuse alcoholics-anonymous alcoholism books chris-prentiss drug-abuse passages-malibu reading recovery relapse Chris Prentiss
b124c01 I thought of all the summer evenings I'd spent sitting in the chairs under the trees beside the trailer, reading books that helped me escape Creek View, at least for a little while. Magical kingdoms, Russian love triangles, and the March sisters couldn't have been further away from the trailer park. books books-reading escape escape-from-reality little-women louisa-may-alcott love-of-books love-of-reading read reading reading-quotes trailer trailer-park Heather Demetrios
bc4c558 Father is a school ... He always wanted to write books. But he became rich instead, so is not allowed. books wealth wishes writing Iain Pears
661de21 A book won't move your eyes for you like TV or a movie does. A book won't move your mind unless you give it your mind, or your heart unless you put your heart in it. It won't do the work for you. To read a good novel well is to follow it, to act it, to feel it, to become it--everything short of writing it, in fact. Reading is a collaboration, an act of participation. No wonder not everybody is up to it. books reading Ursula K. Le Guin
43854a2 "Here is how I propose to end book-banning in this country once and for all: Every candidate for school committee should be hooked up to a lie detector and asked this question: "Have you read a book from start to finish since high school?" or "Did you even read a book from start to finish in high school?" If the truthful answer is "no," then the candidate should be told politely that he cannot get on the school committee and blow off his big bazoo about how books make children crazy. Whenever ideas are squashed in this country, literate lovers of the American experiment write careful and intricate explanations of why all ideas must be allowed to live. It is time for them to realize that they are attempting to explain America at its bravest and most optimistic to orangutans. From now on, I intend to limit my discourse with dimwitted Savonarolas to this advice: "Have somebody read the First Amendment to the United States Constitution out loud to you, you God damned fool!" Well--the American Civil Liberties Union or somebody like that will come to the scene of trouble, as they always do. They will explain what is in the Constitution, and to whom it applies. They will win. And there will be millions who are bewildered and heartbroken by the legal victory, who think some things should never be said--especially about religion. They are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Hi ho." book-banning books censorship constitution first-amendment freedom-of-speech literature united-states-of-america Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
69520e6 "Nothing...They're from nothing,' he said. 'They came in the book...I found the book and inside were these flowers...They were in the book when I bought it... I bought it used...Because they meant something." 'To someone else.' 'To someone." books flowers Aimee Bender
fb7c1e5 To educate myself, I had to understand everything. Starting with myself, me, Marji, the woman. books Marjane Satrapi
ee6160b Hammett used to be irritated by that and would answer that nobody ever deliberately wrote a potboiler, you just did the best you could and woke up to find it good or no good. books dashiell-hammett potboilers quality sanctuary william-faulkner writers Lillian Hellman
6dde416 Instead of filling in the blanks, I wanted to be blank and be filled in. books reading Walter Kirn
48e1de8 It was immediately clear that the book had been undisturbed for a very long time, perhaps even since it had been laid to rest. The librarian fetched a checked duster, and wiped away the dust, a black, thick, tenacious Victorian dust, a dust composed of smoke and fog particles accumulated before the Clean Air acts. books dust librarians library library-books london pollution victorian A.S. Byatt
8566a39 The chambermaid believed in courtly love. A book's physical self was sacrosanct to her, its form inseparable from its content; her duty as a lover was Platonic adoration, a noble but doomed attempt to conserve forever the state of perfect chastity in which it had left the bookseller. books mint-condition Anne Fadiman
fc6b4f5 It is odd, isn't it? Whenever I read something interesting, I tear out a piece and keep it as a talisman until I find something new to replace it with. It's a sort of superstition. I did it once and it helped me break out of writer's block, so I've done it ever since. Librarians must hate me. books librarian Mohsin Hamid
1596ff3 Keynes was a voracious reader. He had what he called 'one of the best of all gifts - the eye which can pick up the print effortlessly'. If one was to be a good reader, that is to read as easily as one breathed, practice was needed. 'I read the newspapers because they're mostly trash,' he said in 1936. 'Newspapers are good practice in learning how to skip; and, if he is not to lose his time, every serious reader must have this art.' Travelling by train from New York to Washington in 1943, Keynes awed his fellow passengers by the speed with which he devoured newspapers and periodicals as well as discussing modern art, the desolate American landscape and the absence of birds compared with English countryside.54 'As a general rule,' Keynes propounded as an undergraduate, 'I hate books that end badly; I always want the characters to be happy.' Thirty years later he deplored contemporary novels as 'heavy-going', with 'such misunderstood, mishandled, misshapen, such muddled handling of human hopes'. Self-indulgent regrets, defeatism, railing against fate, gloom about future prospects: all these were anathema to Keynes in literature as in life. The modern classic he recommended in 1936 was Forster's A Room with a View, which had been published nearly thirty years earlier. He was, however, grateful for the 'perfect relaxation' provided by those 'unpretending, workmanlike, ingenious, abundant, delightful heaven-sent entertainers', Agatha Christie, Edgar Wallace and P. G. Wodehouse. 'There is a great purity in these writers, a remarkable absence of falsity and fudge, so that they live and move, serene, Olympian and aloof, free from any pretended contact with the realities of life.' Keynes preferred memoirs as 'more agreeable and amusing, so much more touching, bringing so much more of the pattern of life, than ... the daydreams of a nervous wreck, which is the average modern novel'. He loved good theatre, settling into his seat at the first night of a production of Turgenev's A Month in the Country with a blissful sigh and the words, 'Ah! this is the loveliest play in all the world.'55 Rather as Keynes was a grabby eater, with table-manners that offended Norton and other Bloomsbury groupers, so he could be impatient to reach the end of books. In the inter-war period publishers used to have a 'gathering' of eight or sixteen pages at the back of their volumes to publicize their other books-in-print. He excised these advertisements while reading a book, so that as he turned a page he could always see how far he must go before finishing. A reader, said Keynes, should approach books 'with all his senses; he should know their touch and their smell. He should learn how to take them in his hands, rustle their pages and reach in a few seconds a first intuitive impression of what they contain. He should ... have touched many thousands, at least ten times as many as he reads. He should cast an eye over books as a shepherd over sheep, and judge them with the rapid, searching glance with which a cattle-dealer eyes cattle.' Keynes in 1927 reproached his fellow countrymen for their low expenditure in bookshops. 'How many people spend even PS10 a year on books? How many spend 1 per cent of their incomes? To buy a book ought to be felt not as an extravagance, but as a good deed, a social duty which blesses him who does it.' He wished to muster 'a mighty army ... of Bookworms, pledged to spend PS10 a year on books, and, in the higher ranks of the Brotherhood, to buy a book a week'. Keynes was a votary of good bookshops, whether their stock was new or second-hand. 'A bookshop is not like a railway booking-office which one approaches knowing what one wants. One should enter it vaguely, almost in a dream, and allow what is there freely to attract and influence the eye. To walk the rounds of the bookshops, dipping in as curiosity dictates, should be an afternoon's entertainment. books bookshops library Richard Davenport-Hines
7b24c32 I can arrange words on a page but I can't seem to organize books on a shelf. Over the years, My Secret has shelved thousands and thousands, held each one in his hands. He thinks they might have seeped into him, through his skin, as much as the books he's read. At night and on his days off we spend hours talking about writing. He reads three or four books at a time. When he's not working at the bookstore he goes to other bookstores around the city and browses until closing time. Holding more volumes in his hands, filling himself up with words. book-sellers books francesca-lia-block the-thorn-necklace words writing Francesca Lia Block
73aa49e At my most precarious, I balanced on a book, and the books rafted me over the tides of feelings that left me soaked and shattered. books feelings literature reading safety Jeanette Winterson
597ca16 If nothing else, school teaches that there is an answer to every question; only in the real world do young people discover that many aspects of life are uncertain, mysterious, and even unknowable. If you have a chance to play in nature, if you are sprayed by a beetle, if the color of a butterfly's wing comes off on your fingers, if you watch a caterpillar spin its cocoon-- you come away with a sense of mystery and uncertainty. The more you watch, the more mysterious the natural world becomes, and the more you realize how little you know. Along with its beauty, you may also come to experience its fecundity, its wastefulness, aggressiveness, ruthlessness, parasitism, and its violence. These qualities are not well-conveyed in textbooks. books insects knowledge learning life nature plants school Michael Crichton
6a8e9cf It takes more courage to disturb the neighborhood than it takes to disturb the universe. And the price is often higher. books change courage creativity ideas revolution science E.L. Konigsburg
e739ff4 Excellent papier. Rien a voir avec les pates mecaniques d'aujourd'hui... Vous savez quelle est la duree de vie moyenne d'un livre imprime a l'heure actuelle ?... Dis lui, Pablo. - Soixante-dix ans, repondit l'autre avec rancoeur, comme si Corso etait le coupable. Soixante-dix miserables annees. Le frere aine cherchait quelque chose parmi les objets disperses sur la table. Finalement, il s'empara d'une loupe speciale a fort grossissement et l'approcha du livre. - Dans moins d'un siecle, murmura-t-il tandis qu'il soulevait une page pour l'etudier a contre-jour en fermant un oeil, presque tout ce qui se trouve aujourd'hui dans les librairies aura disparu. Mais ces volumes imprimes il y a deux cents ou cinq cents ans, demeureront intacts... Nous avons les livres, comme le monde, que nous meritons... N'est-ce pas, Pablo ? - Des livres de merde pour un monde de merde. books handmade-books literature paper philosophy world Arturo Pérez-Reverte
2f939f6 For the novelist or poet, for the scientist or artist, the question is not do ideas come from, the question is how they come. The is the mystery. The how is fragile. artists books creativity ideas inspiration novelists poems poets science scientists E.L. Konigsburg
fa347a4 It was a pity that most people didn't actually go to libraries anymore, not when they could sit in the comfort of their own quarters and access files electronically. Want to read the new hot interstellar caper novel, or the latest issue of holozine? Input the name, touch a control, and - it's in your datapad. . . . There were, of course, old-fashioned beings who would still actually trundle down to where the files were. On some worlds the most ancient libraries kept books - actual bound volumes of printed matter - lined up neatly on shelves, and readers would walk the aisles, take a volume down, sniff the musty-dusty odor of it, and then carry it to a table to leisurely peruse. There weren't many of those readers left, and they were growing rarer all the time . . . But there were some who still knew how to actually turn a page - and for those who were willing to do so, the rewards could be great indeed. books e-readers reading Michael Reaves and Steve Perry
a3a6adc The world promises you so much...and leaves you empty. God's promises are for real and forever. books god jesus-christ promises promises-in-the-dark world Beth Moore Jones
0e95979 How must it have felt, Pikes, the night they seized your films, like entrails yanked from the camera, out of your guts, clutching them in coils and wads to stuff them up a stove to burn away! Did it feel as bad as having some fifty thousand books annihilated with no recompense? Yes. Yes. Stendahl felt his hands grow cold with the senseless anger. books censorship destruction Ray Bradbury
ebc9679 You just read your books and go on a hundred miles away, You ignore me. books reading Barbara Kingsolver
717f5e7 "I'll tell you something," said Francis,urgent with shoe lace, "if we keep on saying things weren't when we know perfectly well they were, we shall soon dish up any sort of chance of magic we may ever have had. When do you find people in books going on like that? They just say 'This is magic!' and behave as if it was. They don't go pretending they're not sure. Why, no magic would stand it." Book: Wet Magic, Chapter 2" books magic E. Nesbit
07ddba8 "A book is a beautiful, paper mausoleum, or tomb, in which to store ideas... to keep the bones of your thoughts in one place, for all time I just want to say - "Hello. We can hear you. The words survived." books fame literature words Caitlin Moran
3fff5bc "A book is a beautiful, paper mausoleum, or tomb, in which to store ideas... to keep the bones of your thoughts in one place, for all time. I just want to say - "Hello. We can hear you. The words survived." books fame literature words Caitlin Moran
a83dba0 "You think there's something materialistic about collecting books, but really collectors are the last romantics. We're the only ones who still love books as objects." "That's the question," said Jess. "How do you love them if you're always selling them?" "I don't sell everything," he said. "You haven't seen my own collection." "What do you have?" "First editions. Yeats, Dickinson- all three volumes; Eliot, Pound, Millay..." He had noticed the books she read in the store. "Plath. I also have Elizabeth Bishop." "I wish I could see them," Jess said. "You would have come to my house." "Are you inviting me?" She must have known this was a loaded question, but she asked without flirtatiousness or self-consciousness, as if to say, I only want to know as a point of information. Yes, he thought, I'm inviting you, but he did not say yes. He was her employer. She could act with a certain plucky independence, but he would always be the big bad wolf." books famous-authors jess-and-george Allegra Goodman
455734e Ti do un consiglio: quando sei giovane e ti capita di leggere qualcosa che non ti piace affatto, mettilo da parte e rileggilo tra tre anni dopo. Se ancora non ti piace, rileggilo dopo altri tre anni. E quando sei giovane - quando arrivi ai cinquant'anni come me - rileggerai il libro che ti e piaciuto in assoluto di meno. booklover books inspirational leggere lettura Jeanette Winterson
2c898c3 Miro hacia la biblioteca. Aquella sabiduria no calmaria nunca su fuego; siglos y siglos de palabras no podian satisfacer aquel deseo imperativo e irracional. books desire frustration knowledge libraries longing sex wisdom world-literature Richard Matheson
72f0e5f "Across the Universe takes place entirely on a generation spaceship, and, aside from a brief introduction, is not on Earth at all. But obviously, something had to have been happening on Earth. Something that would stem from the world that made the Financial Resource Exchange (FRX) and phydus. atu-series books the-body-electric Beth Revis
576d556 Cosa c'e di meglio, in realta, che starsene la sera accanto al fuoco con un bel libro in mano, mentre il vento sbatte contro le persiane e arde il lume della lampada? books reading Gustave Flaubert
ecd81d0 I sit, tired of reading. I am sick of books. I can't tell where I leave off and the books begin. I'm nobody. I'm a polluted nothing. A confessed sin, an open door, the clutterer in the clutter. books burnout ennui reading Katherine Dunn
6a1247b The bookshelves were lined with Joan Didion and Flannery O'Connor, a small, unexpected collection of musicalia, essay collections on Leonard Cohen and Neil Young. There was a framed poster of an exhibit of romantic landscape paintings in Dresden. Intellectuals had their own thing going, that was for sure. books intellectuals music Gary Shteyngart
f170e48 Imensamente generosos, os meus livros, nao me fazem nenhuma exigencia, antes me oferecem todo tipo de iluminacao. books library livro Alberto Manguel
4c71600 Tal como os livros de Petrarca, os meus sabem infinitamente mais do que eu e agradeco-lhes por sequer tolerarem a minha presenca. Por vezes, sinto que abuso desse privilegio. books library livro Alberto Manguel
93f7104 Holding a precious book meant to Mendel what an assignment with a woman might to another man. These moments were his platonic nights of love. Books had power over him; money never did. Great collectors, including the founder of a collection in Princeton University Library, tried in vain to recruit him as an adviser and buyer for their libraries--Jakob Mendel declined; no one could imagine him anywhere but in the Cafe Gluck. Thirty-three years ago, when his beard was still soft and black and he had ringlets over his forehead, he had come from the east to Vienna, a crook-backed lad, to study for the rabbinate, but he had soon abandoned Jehovah the harsh One God to give himself up to idolatry in the form of the brilliant, thousand-fold polytheism of books. That was when he had first found his way to the Cafe Gluck, and gradually it became his workplace, his headquarters, his post office, his world. Like an astronomer alone in his observatory, studying myriads of stars every night through the tiny round lens of the telescope, observing their mysterious courses, their wandering multitude as they are extinguished and then appear again, so Jakob Mendel looked through his glasses out from that rectangular table into the other universe of books, also eternally circling and being reborn in that world above our own. books collecting-books knowledge love obsession reading Stefan Zweig
e2a0996 "Yorick's Used and Rare Books had a small storefront on Channing but a deep interior shaded by tall bookcases crammed with history, poetry, theology, antiquated anthologies. There was no open wall space to hang the framed prints for sale, so Hogarth's scenes of lust, pride, and debauchery leaned rakishly against piles of novels, folk tales, and literary theory. In the back room these piles were so tall and dusty that they took on a geological air, rising like stalagmites. Jess often felt her workplace was a secret mine or quarry where she could pry crystals from crevices and sweep precious jewels straight off the floor. As she tended crowded shelves, she opened one volume and then another, turning pages on the history of gardens, perusing Edna St. Vincent Millay: "We were very tired, were very merry, / We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry..." dipping into Gibbon: "The decline of Rome was the natural and inevitable effect of immoderate greatness. Prosperity ripened the principle of decay..." and old translations of Grimm's Fairy Tales: "They walked the whole day over meadows, fields, and stony places. And when it rained, the little sister said, 'Heaven and our hearts are weeping together..." books bookstore genres gibbon grimm-fairy-tales hogarth jess-bach Allegra Goodman
fcdc476 Mia madre non voleva che i libri cadessero nelle mie mani. Non aveva previsto che io potessi cadere nei libri, che mi infilassi dentro di loro per stare al sicuro. books letteratura libri libro scrittore scrittrice Jeanette Winterson
cbabddd I don't know what to say about it, except that it moved me in a way one hopes to be moved each time he begins a book. book books history-of-love nicole-krauss reading Nicole Krauss
d576cf2 Un lettore non vede veramente i personaggi di una storia. Li sente. books Cornelia Funke
aaf97af "I just love the way those old-time authors like Mr. Dickens or George Eliot (who was actually a woman, in case you didn't know) stop smack-dab in the middle of the story and say stuff like, "patient reader," and then give some little side comment." books reading Kathryn Lasky
1a7dae2 Dona Lorena, una bibliotecaria sabia que rondaba por alli por las tardes, siempre me preparaba una pila de libros que denominaba <>. Dona Lorena decia que el nivel de barbarie de una sociedad se mide por la distancia que intenta poner entre las mujeres y los libros. <>. Durante la guerra la metieron en la carcel de mujeres y dijeron que se habia ahorcado en su celda. books lectura librarian libros mujeres reading women Carlos Ruiz Zafón
be97c00 Turner had never met a kid like Elwood before. was the word he returned to, even though the Tallahassee boy looked soft, conducted himself like a goody-goody, and had an irritating tendency to preach. Wore eyeglasses you wanted to grind underfoot like a butterfly. He talked like a white college boy, read books when he didn't have to, and mined them for uranium to power his own personal A-bomb. Still--sturdy. books intelligence nerds reading softness sturdiness Colson Whitehead
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