Browse through our collection of quotes tagged with Books.
The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.
Jane Austen
Provided that nothing like useful knowledge could be gained from them, provided they were all story and no reflection, she had never any objection to books at all.
Every reader, if he has a strong mind, reads himself into the book, and amalgamates his thoughts with those of the author
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I thought... that we could at least talk about books.
Cassandra Clare
The cultivation of literary pursuits forms the basis of all sciences, and in their perfection consist the reputation and prosperity of kingdoms.
Marques De Pombal
Literature transforms and intensifies ordinary language, deviates systematically from everyday speech. If you approach me at a bus stop and murmur Thou still unravished bride of quietness, then I am instantly aware that I am in the presence of the literary.
Terry Eagleton
The greatest masterpiece in literature is only a dictionary out of order.
Jean Cocteau
Definition of a classic: a book everyone is assumed to have read and often thinks they have.
Alan Bennett
Literature must become party literature. Down with unpartisan litterateurs! Down with the superman of literature! Literature must become a part of the general cause of the proletariat.
Lenin (Vladimir Ulyanov)
My only objection to the custom of giving books as Christmas presents is perhaps the selfish one that it encourages and keeps in the game a number of writers who would be far better employed if they abandoned the pen and took to work.http://wodehouse.ru/tt171201.htm
P. G. [Sir Pelham Grenville] Wod
Literature is the one place in any society where, within the secrecy of our own heads, we can hear voices talking about everything in every possible way.
Salman Rushdie
Literature could be said to be a sort of disciplined technique for arousing certain emotions.
Iris Murdoch
If I read a book that impresses me, I have to take myself firmly in hand before I mix with other people; otherwise they would think my mind rather queer.
Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young
Having books published is very destructive to writing. It is even worse than making love too much. Because when you make love too much at least you get a damned clarte that is like no other light. A very clear and hollow light.
Ernest Hemingway
The naturalistic literature of this country has reached such a state that no family of characters is considered true to life which does not include at least two hypochondriacs, one sadist, and one old man who spills food down the front of his vest.
Robert Benchley
A classic is classic not because it conforms to certain structural rules, or fits certain definitions (of which its author had quite probably never heard). It is classic because of a certain eternal and irrepressible freshness.
Ezra Pound
A best-seller is the golden touch of mediocre talent.
Logan Pearsall Smith
There is but one way left to save a classic: to give up revering him and use him for our own salvation.
Jos
Do not worry about the incarnation of ideas. If you are a poet, your works will contain them without your knowledge -- they will be both moral and national if you follow your inspiration freely.
Vissarion Belinsky
A literary movement consists of five or six people who live in the same town and hate each other cordially.
George Moore
