Famous quotes
Quotes by famous people, credited to who said them. Your own quotes must not match any of these. More are added all the time. 1,158,808 quotes Who coined it · How we decide
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Books and reading
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“I think everything one reads tends to linger on in one's writing, even after one's forgotten the book one's read. (The Massachusetts Review, 1988)”
Anita Desai (born 1937) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“(If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be?) “History of the Jews,” by Heinrich Graetz…it taught me that a writer lacking history, however gifted, is an empty sack.”
Cynthia Ozick (born 1928) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“He started to look at me in a manner I recognized: it was the way I looked at a new book, one I had never read before, one that surprised me with all it had to say.”
Alice Hoffman (born 1952) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Blackbird House (2004)
“I've always believed there is a very thin line that separates readers and writers. You make a leap over that line when there's a book you want to read and you can't find it and you have to write it yourself. (preface)”
Alice Hoffman (born 1952) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“During my radiation treatment I read Man's Search for Meaning. People said, Isn't that book depressing? But it wasn't. It was honest...We are all responsible for our actions, and our reactions. We are responsible for how we respond to situations we cannot control. (p 43)”
Alice Hoffman (born 1952) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is only when one ascends the mountains that the grand panorama is unfolded, and the book of nature is spread out, as it were, where an invitation is extended to all who will read.”
Morton John Elrod (1863–1953) said by 1953 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Menzel, Clare (August 6, 2017). "Field Notes from a Century on the Shoreline". Flathead Beacon.
“Travel is always surprising. You can never read enough about a destination in a book to understand or to see what it's like until you get there. So, I tend to reserve my judgment about places because every time I've gone to different places I've been surprised. And I love that.”
Sunita Williams (born 1965) first seen 2010 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interview in the Condé Nast Traveller by Sahar Khan (2010).
“I picked home economics because I was lazy. I didn’t want to learn. I came to understand that it is one of the toughest things to actually do. Because the practical consumes so much of your time that you are unable to read your book. It was tough, and that’s where I learned my first lesson: nothing in life is easy. Everything is difficult. So far as you want to succeed at it, it is difficult,”
MzVee (born 1992) first seen 2023 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: I studied Home Economics in SHS because I wanted an easy way out – MzVee, Myjoyonline, 21 February 2023.
“The relationship we develop with a classic is like a lifelong friendship: it goes through ups and downs. Whenever we reopen the book, we are different, and, as a result, what we read is too. This, I think, is another definition of a literary classic: like a mirror, it reflects what is in front of it.”
Ilan Stavans (born 1961) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Stoker is the boring and inflexible director of the Lyceum Theatre. He writes an exceptionally erotic, oral and feverish tale that is avoided like the plague. So I would tell people to read it. Nobody reads the book in this town.”
James V. Hart (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.”
Luvvie Ajayi (born 1985) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When I looked at the world, I didn’t see a space for myself. Not in TV series, not when I read a book … there was nobody who represented people with disabilities. I decided, ‘I’m going to create that space.’”
Tanzila Khan (born 1986) first seen 2022 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Tanzila Khan: disability rights campaigner tells young women ‘the world is yours’ The Guardian (May 24, 2022)
“...A really good book is one that never leaves me once I’ve read it; a story and characters and scenes which haunt me forever after...”
Ali Sparkes (born 1966) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Greater familiarity of European men and women with the Sacred Scriptures leads towards that experience of burning fire in the heart which was experienced by the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. The Bible read and prayed, in particular by young people, is the book of the future for the European continent.”
Carlo Maria Martini (1927–2012) first seen 1999 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: H. Em. Card. Carlo Maria MARTINI, Archbishop of Milan (7 October 1999) Press Office of the Holy See
“In the darkness, he found her and it was as if the discovery encompassed him at the same time. She was in a secret forest-place of night, where no pain could enter. His body, his lips and hands, made gleams of light by which she could read at last all the answers to hunger. (book 3 chapter 6)”
Jo Sinclair (1913–1995) said by 1995 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Though there is more I could say on this – details that would both elicit sympathy and make me look like a spoiled little shit – that was all there really was to it. The slow, boring poison of drink and secret-keeping, spread out into every part of my life, so that nothing was safe or good any more. Until I woke up one day and realised I could not remember the last time I had read a book.”
Megan Nolan (born 1990) first seen 2019 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 'The sense I was clever was knocked out of me': confessions of a university dropout", The Guardian (9 August 2019)
“Africa is big: fifty-four countries, 900 million people who are too busy starving and dying and warring and emigrating to read your book. The continent is full of deserts, jungles, highlands, savannahs and many other things, but your reader doesn’t care about all that, so keep your descriptions romantic and evocative and unparticular.”
Binyavanga Wainaina (1971–2019) said by 2019 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Every book I’ve read has influenced me in some way.”
Stephen Buoro (born 1993) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I read this book of ’, Direct Use of the Sun’s Energy, and it just lit up my brain.”
Steve Baer (1938–2024) said by 2024 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[asked what readers can expect from her book] Surprises and to challenge our own ideas of humanity. Novels are the home for irony, paradox, contradiction—all the things that make humans interesting to read and write about. (2021)”
Rita Williams-Garcia (born 1957) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I never told my family about the full nature of my work. Years later, my father read my book and he was shocked, saying that this was dangerous. I had to reassure him that it was all in the past, and I was now safe. I resigned from the police with the rank equivalent to senior superintendent in 2000.”
Micki Pistorius (born 1961) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I was still in the queue at the bookshop when I read the contents page, and I began to smile, because Tongues of their Mothers—my second poetry collection—is also divided into four sections using the names of seasons. In your book, there are eleven poems in Winter, fifteen in Summer, three in Spring and thirteen in Autumn.”
Makhosazana Xaba (born 1957) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The book is a commercial hit in French bookstores, proving that, contrary to what some believe, the public not only wants to read what we have to say, but they share our values of inclusion and diversity.”
Aïssa Maïga (born 1975) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“... the months that followed 's must have been dreary enough. Fortunately, his new book—the one thing that had made the last year bearable—still provided some distraction for his thoughts. had just been published by . There were reviews to be read, copies must be sent to old friends. He had taken great pains with the looks of his "bantling" and was satisfied.”
Margaret Neilson Armstrong (1867–1944) first seen 1858 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1st part of quote; last part of quote; (pbk reprint of 1858 1st edition); text of 1858 edition at archive.org
“I became interested in AI in high school because I read 'Goedel, Escher, Bach,' a book by Douglas Hofstader. He showed how all their work in some ways fit together, and he talked about artificial intelligence. I thought 'Wow, this is what I want to be doing.'”
Oren Etzioni (born 1964) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It doesn’t have to look a certain way; it just has to work for you. Whether that is getting up at 5am (I personally couldn’t think of anything worse) or taking half an hour a day to turn all your devices off and read a book – whatever it is it doesn’t have to fit in with what other people think it should.”
Brianne West (born 1985) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If you imagine you are going to read of model children, with perhaps a naughtily inclined one to point a moral, you had better lay down the book immediately and betake yourself to "Sandford and Merton" or similar standard juvenile works. Not one of the seven is really good, for the very excellent reason that Australian children never are.”
Ethel Turner (1870–1958) said by 1958 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“For those people who will read the book, you will see that my belief in the loving God is like a running strain in my life. So ups and downs, light and darkness, sadness and joy and all throughout, I knew God protects me and God Is my rock and my salvation”
Loida Nicolas Lewis (born 1942) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In the 1980s, Franco and I had common interests beyond music. We had both arrived, by different paths, at the teachings of the philosopher and mystic Gurdjieff. In 1981, I was given his book ‘'Meetings with Remarkable Men’', and it took me two years before I opened it: I read it in one sitting. I was finally ready.”
Franco Battiato (1945–2021) said by 2021 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I was carried away, swept along by the mighty stream of words pouring from the hundreds of pages. To me it was the ultimate book: once you had read it, neither your own life nor the world you lived in would ever look the same.”
“(About Roberto Vannacci's book Il mondo al contrario) When you read that sort of thing, you think: "Ok, let's dissolve the army, let's dissolve the institutions, and let's set up a huge bar: Bar Italia, right?”
Pier Luigi Bersani (born 1951) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Not only did I read Gomorra (a book of Roberto Saviano), but I also enjoyed it. And even if I hadn't liked it, nothing would have changed. Because a liberal publisher keeps his personal opinions separate from the publishing house's decisions.”
Marina Berlusconi (born 1966) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Lay me soft on green grass like an offering. Take off my clothes one at a time like you are opening the Holy Book. Read the verses of my body until you master all chapters. Drink from my river of life. Make me your altar; wine your last supper.”
Harriet Anena wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A book is not written for oneself; it is written to be read, to spark thought, and to create a dialogue between the writer and the world.”
Olympe Bhêly-Quenum (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Every time when I have an opportunity to go and read Dikeledi to younger people back home, I tell them “I’ve written this book so that you know your story will be told and will be remembered in 100 years’ time, but also so that we can talk about this. It should not be a taboo anymore”
Sabata-Mpho Mokae first seen 2018 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: SO THAT YOU KNOW YOUR STORY WILL BE TOLD: AN INTERVIEW WITH SABATA-MPHO MOKAE 7 December 2018
“I didn’t read the book. I wasn’t a fan of the idea of playing a maid”
Lela Rochon (born 1964) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.”
Groucho Marx (misattributed) first seen 1947 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As per research conducted by Quote Investigator, more than 25 years before its first in-print attribution to Marx, on April 5, 1973 (as "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. That's because inside a dog it's to…
“Read the text ‘I have not created Jinns and men but to worship me,’ The only object of the world is to worship God. Though the object of a book is to teach an art, If you make a pillow of it, it serves that purpose too, Yet its main object is not to serve as a pillow But to impart knowledge and useful instruction.”
Rumi (attributed) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Rommel, you magnificent bastard! I read your book!”
George S. Patton (misattributed) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The world is a great book, of which they that never stir from home read only a page.”
Augustine of Hippo (misattributed) first seen 1753 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed to Augustine in "Select Proverbs of All Nations" (1824) by "Thomas Fielding" (John Wade), p. 216, and later in the form "The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page", as quoted in 20,000…
“If you read Peter Farb's book, Man's Rise of Civilization, he goes through all these different cultures at first contact, and they very often figure out in very different ways, but typically the things that were in common among them, were that the idea of the accumulation of private property beyond your needs was considered a mental illness.”
Peter Farb (disputed) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When a new book comes out, I read an old one.”
Samuel Rogers (attributed) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Motherfuckers will read a book that’s one third elvish, but put two sentences in Spanish and they [white people] think we’re taking over.”
Junot Díaz (misattributed) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Your face, my thane, is as a book where men May read strange matters. To beguile the time, Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye, Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower, But be the serpent under 't.”
William Shakespeare (1564–1616) said by 1616 at the latest bartlett, Public domain source
“All at once I was full of plans. Laguna Beach! That was the place for her. It was winter now, and we could get a place cheap. I could take care of her and get started on another book. I had an idea for a new book. We didn't have to be married, brother and sister was alright with me.”
John Fante (1909–1983) said by 1983 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“George Romero filmed an homage to the book, and he called it Night of the Living Dead. Homage means I can make the picture and I don't have to pay you for your book. As a teen-ager I saw the movie "Dracula," and it occurred to me that if one vampire was scary, a whole world populated by vampires would be really scary.”
Richard Matheson (1926–2013) said by 2013 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Thus have I sorrowed, Learning to my cost That a book that's borrowed Is a book that's lost!”
Arthur Guiterman (1871–1943) first seen 1930 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Also in The New York Times (June 28, 1930) p. 14, col. 7 (with "Much" not "Thus")
“Saying the Bible is not a book about science is like saying a cookbook is not a book about chemistry.”
Robert J. Marks II (born 1950) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Book #10: A Book of Travellers' Tales. As it hits the water its pages detach themselves from the covers, which sink... and the pages form themselves into small paper boats that float away on the tide.”
Peter Greenaway (born 1942) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Go on. Treat me like the page of a book. Your book.”
Peter Greenaway (born 1942) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source