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“I kid the Republicans, with love. I feel bad for them. They got nobody for next time. Who are they gonna run? Sarah Palin, reading off her hand. Did you see that? You saw this? She wrote "tax cuts" on her hand. A Republican so stupid she has to be reminded of the one thing– Tax cuts! This is like if you saw the coyote's paw and it said "Road Runner".”
Bill Maher (born 1956) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“These beltway elitists, these limousine liberals here in New York, don’t live in the real world and Blacks have to, and browns have to deal with the real world every day, and we don’t sit in crowded subways reading left-wing or right-wing propaganda.”
Al Sharpton (born 1954) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Much reading is an oppression of the mind, and extinguishes the natural candle, which is the reason of so many senseless scholars in the world.”
William Penn (1644–1718) said by 1718 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I shall be reading poems that are meant to dispense with conventional language, no less, and to have done with it. Dada Johann Fuchsgang Goethe. Dada Stendhal. Dada Dalai Lama, Buddha, Bible, and Nietzsche. Dada m'dada. Dada mhm dada da. It's a question of connections, and of loosening them up a bit to start with. I don't want words that other people have invented..”
Hugo Ball (1886–1927) said by 1927 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“After all, what is reading but a vice, like drink or venery or any other form of excessive self-indulgence? One reads to tickle and amuse one's mind; one reads, above all, to prevent oneself thinking.”
Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reading the morning newspaper is the realist's morning prayer. One orients one's attitude toward the world either by God or by what the world is. The former gives as much security as the latter, in that one knows how one stands.”
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) said by 1831 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Miscellaneous writings of G.W.F. Hegel, translation by Jon Bartley Stewart, Northwestern University Press, 2002, page 247.
“Nor do I propose to defend the right to talk on a mobile while driving a car, though I don't believe that is necessarily any more dangerous than the many other risky things that people do with their free hands while driving - nose-picking, reading the paper, studying the A-Z, beating the children, and so on.”
Boris Johnson (born 1964) first seen 2002 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To the lady who berated me, I say: on your bike", The Daily Telegraph (1 August 2002), p. 21.
“If you want a peaceful place to dwell Cold Mountain is guaranteed forever A light wind blows softly in the pines The sound is good when you are close One old man sits beneath the trees Reading Lao Tzu and Huang Ti, mumbling I could not find the world if I searched ten years I've forgotten the road by which I came”
Hanshan (born 800) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Do you have the poems of Han-shan in your house? They're better for you than sutra reading! Write them out and paste them on a screen Where you can glance over them from time to time”
Hanshan (born 800) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Fatemeh Keshavarz, Reading Mystical Lyric: The Case of Jalal al-Din Rumi (1998)”
Rumi (1207–1273) said by 1273 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I haven't a creature to talk to...How in Boston, when the evening arrives, and I am tired of reading, and know it would be better to do something else, can I go to the theater? I have tried it, ad nauseam. Likewise calling. Upon whom?”
Henry James (1843–1916) first seen 1866 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to William James (between 1866 and 1869)
“I have two ways of learning from history: from the past, by reading the elders; and from the future, thanks to my Monte Carlo toy.”
Nassim Nicholas Taleb (born 1960) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To be completely cured of newspapers, spend a year reading the previous week’s newspapers.”
Nassim Nicholas Taleb (born 1960) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It was Trout's fantasy that somebody would be outraged by the footprints. This would give him the opportunity to reply grandly, "What is it that offends you so? I am simply using man's first printing press. You are reading a bold and universal headline which says, 'I am here, I am here, I am here.'”
Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) said by 2007 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We would be a lot safer if the Government would take its money out of science and put it into astrology and the reading of palms. I used to think that science would save us, and science certainly tried. But we can't stand any more tremendous explosions, either for or against democracy.”
Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) said by 2007 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I think Ukraine, militarily they are defeated, OK? You wouldn't know that by reading the fake news.”
Donald Trump (born 1946) first seen 2026 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ukraine is 'militarily' defeated: Trump" Fox News (April 29, 2026)
“One more thing: don’t spend too much time merely reading. The best part of this work is the play, so play and enjoy!”
Gary Gygax (1938–2008) first seen 1985 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Preface to the Oriental Adventures (1985)
“Senator Smoot is an institute Not to be bribed with pelf; He guards our homes from erotic tomes By reading them all himself.”
Ogden Nash (1902–1971) said by 1971 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The reading public isn't born that doesn't think foreigners are either funny or faintly sinister.”
Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) first seen 1990 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: P.J. O'Rourke: Not Funny Enough" (1990).
“A young girl in a parkin' lot was preaching to a crowdSinging sacred songs and reading from the BibleWell, I told her I was lost and she told all about the PentecostAnd I seen that girl as the road to my survival...Even now that sweet memory lingers”
Paul Simon (born 1941) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“By the time I was a student in high school I was reading the classic Men of Mathematics by E. T. Bell and I remember succeeding in proving the classic Fermat theorem about an integer multiplied by itself p times where p is a prime.”
John Forbes Nash Jr. (1928–2015) said by 2015 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Nathaniel Hawthorne says, "Easy reading is damn hard writing." I try to pull the language into such a sharpness that it jumps off the page. It must look easy, but it takes me forever to get it to look so easy.”
Maya Angelou (1928–2014) said by 2014 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“And O! how the mind is here washed clean of all its early ingrafted Jewish superstition! It is the most profitable and elevating reading which is possible in the world. It has been the solace of my life, and will be the solace of my death.”
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) said by 1860 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Do you remember Goethe's wise words about reading Spinoza? — “I always preferred knowing what an author himself said, to knowing what others thought he ought to have said.”
Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) said by 1677 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: George Eliot, in her letter to Alexander Main (4 September 1871)
“An important part of Deleuze's oeuvre is devoted to the reading of philosophers: the Stoics, Leibniz, Hume, Kant, Nietzsche, Bergson, etc. But a rather singular position in this list would be assigned to Spinoza, owing to the philosophical interest that corresponds to him [...]”
Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) said by 1677 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Pierre Macherey, in his article 'Deleuze in Spinoza'. In: Warren Montag (ed.), In A Materialist Way: Selected Essays by Pierre Macherey (New York: Verso, 1998)
“Much reading has brought upon us a learned barbarism.”
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–1799) said by 1799 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I was reading in the paper the other day about those birds who are trying to split the atom, the nub being that they haven't the foggiest as to what will happen if they do. It may be all right. On the other hand, it may not be all right. And pretty silly a chap would feel, no doubt, if, having split the atom, he suddenly found the house going up in smoke and himself torn limb from limb.”
P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975) said by 1975 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We take pleasure in watching an athlete break a record, hearing a soprano in full flight, or reading a philosopher of depth and insight. Human accomplishment is the ultimate spectator sport. Apply as much historical analysis to it as we wish, and we’ll not unlock all its mysteries. The continuous capacity of genius to surpass understanding remains a human constant.”
Denis Dutton (1944–2010) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Of Human Accomplishment", The New Criterion (February 2004)
“I see that the Rev. Dr. Eddy advises ministers not to answer the arguments of infidels in the pulpit, and gives this wonderful reason: That the hearers will get more doubts from the answer than from reading the original arguments. So the Rev. Dr. Hawkins admits that he cannot defend Christianity from infidel attacks without creating more infidelity.”
Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) said by 1899 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Writing in English is the most ingenious torture ever devised for sins committed in previous lives. The English reading public explains the reason why.”
James Joyce (1882–1941) first seen 1918 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Fanny Guillermet (Zurich, 5 September 1918)
“The demand that I make of my reader is that he should devote his whole Life to reading my works.”
James Joyce (1882–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interview with Max Eastman in Harper's Magazine, as quoted in James Joyce (1959) by Richard Ellmann. Eastman noted "He smiled as he said that — smiled, and then repeated it.
“He that I am reading seems always to have the most force.”
Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592) said by 1592 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Also quoted by: Michael De Montaigne
“The practice of truth is the most profitable reading of it.”
Charles Spurgeon (1834–1892) first seen 1866 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Morning and Evening (1866), entry for June 20
“I want to quote this— "On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and to my country and obey Scout law", on and on and on and on. I mean, God's in the first 10 words. So – why did you have to tell them you were an atheist if you didn't have any trouble reading the oath? Why didn't you just shut up?”
Bill O'Reilly (commentator) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One should be under no illusions as to the future of the Old World. The real contest in the present day is purely social. In a word the struggle lies between him who has nothing and him who has. Figure out the consequences of such a principle, infiltrated in the masses by the harangues of the clubs and the reading of millions of pamphlets.”
José de San Martín (1778–1850) said by 1850 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to a General Pinto, as quoted in ‪Captain of the Andes : The Life of José de San Martín, Liberator of Argentina, Chile and Peru (1943) b‬y Margaret Hayne Harrison, p. 196
“To my mind there are no advantages and many disadvantages in lectures compared with reading.”
Charles Darwin (1809–1882) said by 1882 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Twenty times in the course of my late reading have I been on the point of breaking out, "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!!!" But in this exclamation I would have been as fanatical as Bryant or Cleverly. Without religion this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in polite company, I mean Hell.”
John Adams (1735–1826) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Original manuscript at The Library of Congress Letter to Thomas Jefferson (19 April 1817). The italicized section within this statement has often been quoted out of context. Earlier in the letter Adams explained "Lemuel…
“The subject [of Stalin's death] permitted a rare blend of invective and speculation—both Hearst papers, as I recall, ran cartoons of Stalin being rebuffed at the gates of Heaven, where Hearst had no correspondents—and I have seldom enjoyed a week of newspaper reading more.”
A. J. Liebling (1904–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Just Enough Liebling: Classic Work by the Legendary New Yorker Writer (2004), p. 23
“Strange reading? It is meant to be. The world is full of romantic, macabre, improbable things which would never do in works of fiction. When those that come within one man's notice are gathered together in a scrapbook, they tell of a world which sobersided folk may not choose to recognize as their own. But it is their own; I have the evidence.”
Robertson Davies (1913–1995) first seen 1960 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Scraps and Morsels (1960).
“An important aspect of Nonconformity was its cult of the Bible as the fount of all wisdom. But the Bible takes much of its colour from whoever is reading it, and it provides a text to support almost every shade of opinion, however preposterous.”
Robertson Davies (1913–1995) first seen 1993 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Melodrama: The Silver King (1993).
“I was reading Dorothy Dix this afternoon; she says that it is permissible for a young man to tell a girl he knows fairly well that she has pretty ankles; from this I assume that the better he knows her the higher he may praise her.”
Robertson Davies (1913–1995) said by 1995 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Bookes give no wisdom where none was before, But where some is, there reading makes it more.”
Robertson Davies (1913–1995) said by 1995 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I think “taste” is a social concept and not an artistic one. I’m willing to show good taste, if I can, in somebody else’s living room, but our reading life is too short for a writer to be in any way polite. Since his words enter into another’s brain in silence and intimacy, he should be as honest and explicit as we are with ourselves.”
John Updike (1932–2009) first seen 1977 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interview in New York Times Book Review (April 10, 1977). later published in Conversations with John Updike (1994) edited by James Plath, p. 113
“Jastrow and a few other astronomers have tried to find God in the universe by reading the big bang as the cosmological equivalent of Genesis. I confess that I have found it hard to take this argument seriously.”
Stephen Jay Gould (1941–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We build our personalities laboriously and through many years, and we cannot order fundamental changes just because we might value their utility; no button reading “positive attitude” protrudes from our hearts, and no finger can coerce positivity into immediate action by a single and painless pressing.”
Stephen Jay Gould (1941–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The present age has witnessed an extraordinary increase of a thinking public, by the facilities afforded to the diffusion of reading; the former happy resignation to ignorance begins to make way for a state of half-enlightenment, and few persons are willing to remain in the condition in which their birth has placed then.”
Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) said by 1805 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A theologian is born by living, nay dying and being damned, not by thinking, reading, or speculating.”
Martin Luther (1483–1546) said by 1546 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It amazes me that filmmakers will still film, and audiences will still watch, relationships so bankrupt of human feeling that the characters could be reading dialogue written by a computer.”
Roger Ebert (1942–2013) first seen 1987 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Review of Summer School (22 July 1987)
“A man who tells secrets or stories must think of who is hearing or reading, for a story has as many versions as it has readers.”
John Steinbeck (1902–1968) said by 1968 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If the Letter is to be in answer to another, begin by getting out that other letter and reading it through, in order to refresh your memory, as to what it is you have to answer, and as to your correspondent’s present address (otherwise you will be sending your letter to his regular address in London, though he has been careful in writing to give you his Torquay address in full).”
Lewis Carroll (1832–1898) said by 1898 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source