Quotes About Books

One of the inconveniences of stealing books—especially for a novice like myself—is that sometimes you have to take what you can get.

Another time, talking about his books, the baroness confessed that she had never bothered to read any of them, because she hardly ever read 'difficult' or 'dark' novels like the ones he wrote. With the years, too, this habit had grown entrenched, and once she turned seventy the scope of her reading was restricted to fashion or news magazines.

I'd obviously never heard of the group, but my ignorance in literary matters is to blame for that (every book in the world is out there waiting to be read by me).

For a while we talked about things I've forgotten now. Or maybe we were silent for a while, me sitting at the foot of his bed, him stretched out with his book, the two of us sneaking looks at each other, listening to the sound the elevator made, as if we were in a dark room or lost in the country at night, just listening to the sound of horses.

Uno no termina de leer, aunque los libros se acaben, de la misma manera que uno no termina de vivir, aunque la muerte sea un hecho cierto.

I try to find the books that I lost or forgot more than 30 years ago on another continent, with the hope and dedication and bitterness of those who search for their first lost books, books that if found I wouldn't read anyway, because I've already read them over and over, but that I would look at and touch just as the miser strokes the coins under which he's buried...Books are like ghosts

no biography of his existed in German even though sales of his books were rising in Germany as well as the rest of Europe and even in the United States, which likes vanished writers (vanished writers or millionaire writers) or the legend of vanished writers…

A leitura é prazer e alegria de estar vivo ou tristeza de estar vivo, e sobretudo é conhecimento de perguntas. [...] É necessário haver muitos livros, muitos pinheiros enfeitiçantes, para que velem de olhares avessos o livro que realmente importa, a porra da gruta da nossa desgraça, a flor mágica do inverno!

His novel or book of poems, decent, adequate, arises not from an exercise of style or will, as the poor unfortunate believes, but as the result of an exercise of concealment. There must be many books, many lovely pines, to shield from hungry eyes the book that really matters, the wretched cave of our misfortune, the magic flower of winter!

Auxilio, they'd say, that's enough bustling around, Auxilio, leave those papers alone, woman, dust and literature have always gone together.

How much better off the poor man would be if he devoted himself to reading.

Uno nunca termina de leer, aunque los libros se acaben, de la misma manera que uno nunca termina de vivir, aunque la muerte sea un hecho cierto.

There must be many books, many lovely pines, to shield from hungry eyes the book that really matters, the wretched cave of our misfortune, the magic flower of winter!

Ay, Ulises Lima... Escribía todo el tiempo, es lo que mas recuerdo de el, en los márgenes de los libros que sustraía y en papeles sueltos que solía perder. y nunca escribía poemas, escribía versos que luego, con suerte, ensamblaba en largos poemas extraños... Belano, por el contrario, escribía en cuadernos... Todavía me deben dinero...

Aunque a veces mi flojera como alumno me provoca repentinos ataques de sueño. Esos ataques se llaman narcolepsia y los sufrió River Phoenix en aquella película de Gus Van Sant. Pero River Phoenix tenía a Keanu Reeves, o dicho de otra manera: Phoenix tenía dónde apoyar su cabeza dormida y yo solo puedo apoyarla en los libros.

todos los libros del mundo están esperando a que los lea).

Kafka understood that travel, sex, and books are paths that lead nowhere except to the loss of the self, and yet they must be followed and the self must be lost, in order to find it again, or to find something, whatever it may be - a book, an expression, a misplaced object - in order to find anything at all, a method, perhaps, and, with a bit of luck, the "new," which has been there all along.

Les Misérablesis a book I read in Mexico many years ago and left behind in Mexico when I left Mexico for good, and I'm not planning to buy it or reread it, because there's no point reading, much less rereading books that have been made into movies...

Toate cartile din lume asteapta sa fie citite.

Y después de coger a mi general le gustaba salir al patio a fumarse su cigarro y a pensar en la tristeza poscoito, en la pinche tristeza de la carne, en todos los libros que no había leído.

Ay Ulises Lima, escribía todo el tiempo (es lo que más recuerdo de él) en los márgenes de los libros que sustraía y en papeles sueltos que solía perder. Y nunca escribía poemas, escribía versos que luego con suerte ensamblaba en largos poemas extraños.

Un libro ti rimane addosso per una vita intera.

Books -- they come home hot in your hands and then by increments they warm your life, like heated bricks in a New England bed.

Walking the stacks in a library, dragging your fingers across the spines -- it's hard not to feel the presence of sleeping spirits.