Famous quotes
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Books and reading
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“A careful reading of the Gita would show anyone that it fully supports the enslavement of Shudras and OBCs, a process initiated by the Rig Veda itself. Rig Veda formulated the caste structure in Purusha Suktha and the Gita upheld it.”
Kancha Ilaiah (born 1952) first seen 2014 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Gita and OBCs" in Deccan Chronicle (20 December 2014).
“The boy who first entered a classroom barely able to speak English, twenty years later concluded his studies in the stately quiet of the reading room in the British Museum. Thus with one sentence I can summarize my academic career. It will be harder to summarize what sort of life connects the boy to the man.”
Richard Rodriguez (born 1944) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I rather enjoy patronage. I take a lot of trouble over it. At least it makes all those years of reading Trollope seem worthwhile.”
Harold Macmillan (1894–1986) first seen 1959 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech in Oxford (June 1959), quoted in D. R. Thorpe, Supermac: The Life of Harold Macmillan (2010), p. 507
“King George VI was always remarkably well informed, and I made a point of reading the latest telegrams before my weekly audience with him. A conscientious, constitutional monarch is a strong element of stability and continuity in our Constitution.”
Clement Attlee (1883–1967) first seen 1957 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Address to the Oxford University Law Society (14 June 1957), quoted in The Times (15 June 1957), p. 4.
“Reading is a discount ticket to everywhere.”
Mary Schmich (born 1953) first seen 1998 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Now Boarding At Any Newspaper, Magazine Or Book", Chicago Tribune, 28 October 1998; reprinted in The Best of Mary Schmich (2012) as "A Discount Ticket to Everywhere".
“Yeah, that came out of a reading. It was great. It's such a fun crew to be with, and we all went out the night before and that really encouraged us to go out and get drunk.”
John Leguizamo (born 1964) first seen 2005 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: John Leguizamo Talks About "Assault on Precinct 13", January 16, 2005.
“So when the 1960's came along I was feeling split, schizophrenic. The war, what was happening to America, the brutality of the world. What kind of man am I, sitting at home, reading magazines, going into a frustrated fury about everything—and then going into my studio to adjust a red to a blue.”
Philip Guston (1913–1980) said by 1980 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: In: 'It's About Freedom' - as quoted in 'It's About Freedom, Philip Guston's Late Works in the Schirn'; Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt 11/6/2013 – 2/2/2014
“The art of fiction is one of constant seduction. You must persuade the reader on page 1 to start reading - on page 50, or page 150 and yes, on page 850. (2004)”
Marge Piercy (born 1936) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Literary texts do not exist on bookshelves: they are processes of signification materialized only in the practice of reading. For literature to happen, the reader is quite as vital as the author.”
Terry Eagleton (born 1943) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reading is not a straightforward linear movement, a merely cumulative affair: our initial speculations generate a frame of reference within which to interpret what comes next, but what comes next may retrospectively transform our original understanding, highlighting some features of it and backgrounding others.”
Terry Eagleton (born 1943) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reading a text is more like tracing this process of constant flickering than it is like counting the beads on a necklace.”
Terry Eagleton (born 1943) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I’m a good scholar when it comes to reading but a blotting kind of writer when you give me a pen.”
John Millington Synge (1871–1909) said by 1909 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[After reading out local newspaper accounts of multiple recent attacks on women and the dress of the suspect] However serious this sex attack was, the real crime was against fashion.”
Russell Brand (born 1975) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I dream of you too, Mariam jo. I miss you. I miss the sound of your voice, your laughter. I miss reading to you, and all the times we fished together. Do you remember all the times we fished together? You were a good daughter, Mariam jo, and I cannot ever think of you without feeling shame and regret. -Jalil's letter”
Khaled Hosseini (born 1965) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I already see things backwards! You see, in printmaking everything comes out backwards so printing is an absolute natural for me. It is difficult for a lot of artists to do prints because they draw one way and can’t imagine it the other way. I always had trouble reading as a child. Every few minutes my mind would shift and I would pick out all the o's, than all the letter a's on a page.”
Robert Rauschenberg (1925–2008) said by 2008 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Although age has its normal limits, it may be extended by two things-the study of history and by travel. Reading history broadens one's perception of the creation of the world, while travel extends one's field of vision.”
Mahmud Tarzi (1865–1933) said by 1933 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Sabbath rest is more than mere abstention from physical work; and, therefore, must include worship and Scripture-reading”
Joseph H. Hertz (1872–1946) said by 1946 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Less smoking and more reading.”
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (born 1960) first seen 2005 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Note: 23rd April 2005.
“Inside the case was a dueling pistol, a king's weapon, wheel-locked, chased in gold. Eddis had seen it earlier that day. When Sounis lifted it out and tipped his head over the locking mechanism, she knew he was reading the letters inscribed there: Onea realia. "The queen made me.”
Megan Whalen Turner (born 1965) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The important thing is what we do, and not the deceitful theory of reading others' intentions. This is also a new thing — they say: "We know that Iran's intention is to pursue nuclear weapons." Do you have a device that reads intentions?”
Ali Larijani (1958–2026) first seen 2005 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The West Should Learn the Lesson of North Korea September 2005.
“One of the good things about Larkin is that he still has you firmly by the hand as you cross the finishing-line, whereas reading Auden is like doing a parachute-drop: for a while the view is wonderful, but then you end up on your back in the middle of a ploughed field and in the wrong county.”
Alan Bennett (born 1934) first seen 1982 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Instead of a Present", p. 323 (1982).
“My father always argued that time was far and away the most valuable commodity we had and that temporal profligacy should be a criminal offense—which kind of makes watching Celebrity Kidney Swap or reading Daphne Farquitt novels a crime straightaway.”
Jasper Fforde (born 1961) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Oh!” said Landen, reading a letter. “A rejection from my publisher. They didn’t think Fatal Parachuting Mistakes and How to Avoid Making Them Again was what they had in mind for self-help.” “I guess their target audience doesn’t include dead people.” “You could be right.”
Jasper Fforde (born 1961) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A lively and lasting sense of filial duty is more effectually impressed on the mind of a son or daughter by reading King Lear, than by all the dry volumes of ethics, and divinity, that ever were written.”
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) first seen 1771 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Robert Skipwith (3 August 1771) ; also in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (19 Vols., 1905) edited by Andrew A. Lipscomb and Albert Ellery Bergh, Vol. 4, p. 239
“The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.”
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) first seen 1787 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Colonel Edward Carrington (16 January 1787) Lipscomb & Bergh ed. 6:57
“My religious reading has long been confined to the moral branch of religion, which is the same in all religions; while in that branch which consists of dogmas, all differ[.]”
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) first seen 1809 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Thomas Leiper (21 January 1809). Published in The Works of Thomas Jefferson in Twelve Volumes, Federal Edition, Paul Leicester Ford, ed., New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1904, Vol. 11, pp. 89
“The result of your fifty or sixty years of religious reading in the four words: 'Be just and good,' is that in which all our enquiries must end.”
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to John Adams (11 January 1817)
“Oh, how I regret not having worn a bikini for the entire year I was twenty-six. If anyone young is reading this, go, right this minute, put on a bikini, and don’t take it off until you’re thirty-four.”
Nora Ephron (1941–2012) first seen 2008 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Nora Ephron: I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman, Random House Incorporated, 2008
“Written poetry is worth reading once, and then should be destroyed. Let the dead poets make way for others. Then we might even come to see that it is our veneration for what has already been created, however beautiful and valid it may be, that petrifies us.”
Antonin Artaud (1896–1948) said by 1948 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We properly judge a critic's virtue not by his freedom from error but by the nature of the mistakes he does make, for he makes them, if he is worth reading, because he has in mind something besides his perceptions about art in itself — he has in mind the demands that he makes upon life.”
Lionel Trilling (1905–1975) said by 1975 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“People are reading news for free on the web, that's got to change.”
Rupert Murdoch (born 1931) first seen 2009 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Comments made on April 2, as quoted in "Murdoch Calls Google, Yahoo Copyright Thieves — Is He Right?" Wired (April 3, 2009)
“Morally, I think men are much stronger, Why? Because women are weaker and less intelligent. [...] That will make me popular. You know perfectly well they are not as intelligent as men, and they have awful squeaky voices. Why do we now have to have a woman reading about the games?”
Barbara Cartland (1901–2000) said by 2000 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Everything I have written is the result of reading or of interest in people.”
Marianne Moore (1887–1972) said by 1972 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in Marianne Moore, Poet of Affection (1977) by Pamela White Hadas, p. 6
“Poetry I too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all this fiddle, Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it one discovers in it after all, a place for the genuine.”
Marianne Moore (1887–1972) said by 1972 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“And my tears, too, have stained this heirloomed ground, When reading in these treatises some weird Miracle, I turned a leaf and found A white hair fallen from my father's beard.”
A. M. Klein (1909–1972) said by 1972 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Heirloom (1982).
“[reading an email] "Dear Craig, … are your letters written by your writers?" No. "Does this make me one of your writers?" (ponders) Yes. "Why haven't I been paid?" Because you're one of my writers!”
Craig Ferguson (born 1962) first seen 2009 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 2009-04-03 broadcast
“He was a learned man, of immense reading, but is much blamed for his unfaithfull quotations.”
John Aubrey (1626–1697) said by 1697 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“(Bartender Harry) How can you tell the male bird from the female bird? (Sylvia) He's the one with the furrowed brow; she's the happy-go-lucky one....He's the one reading the sports page; she's the one with 12 pairs of tiny shoes. (Harry) I don't have time for this.”
Nicole Hollander (1939–2026) said by 2026 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The cells in your head are reading these words. Think how remarkable that is.”
Jeff Hawkins (born 1957) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The correct reading of \vdash p written down by me in good faith is therefore 'I believe p', or some other words expressing the same fiduciary act.”
Michael Polanyi (1891–1976) said by 1976 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Rip It Up: They also met Pearl Jam's Jeff Ament and Mike McCready at the Reading Festival in the U.K. and, much to Daniel's delight, ran into Soundgarden's Chris Cornell in the same area backstage.”
Daniel Johns (born 1979) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Whereas the work is understood to be traceable to a source (through a process of derivation or "filiation"), the Text is without a source — the "author" a mere "guest" at the reading of the Text.”
Roland Barthes (1915–1980) said by 1980 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Rea: My country, above all. Romulus: You see, you've been reading too many tragedies lately. Rea: But shouldn't one love one's country more than anything else in the world? Romulus: No, one should never love it as one loves other human beings. In fact, the most important thing is to mistrust one's country. No one turns killer more easily than one's country.”
Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990) said by 1990 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Many years later I was told that the great specialist had admitted to friends of his that he had altered his treatment of neurasthenia since reading The Yellow Wallpaper. It was not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy, and it worked.”
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935) first seen 1913 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper" in The Forerunner (October 1913).
“A story with no moral isn't worth writing; a story with no plot isn't worth reading. And if people get your point before they get your story, you are to hire a soapbox instead.”
Marion Zimmer Bradley (1930–1999) first seen 1990 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Introduction to Hawk’s Hill in Marion Zimmer Bradley (ed.), Sword and Sorceress 7 (1990), p. 183
“I really enjoy writing. Much more than other people enjoy reading it. What do I write? Nonsense. Diary stuff - when I want to have a conversation but need to clarify my thoughts first.”
Sienna Guillory (born 1975) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: THIS CULTURAL LIFE: SIENNA GUILLORY Article. The Independent on Sunday. 23 May 2004.
“«What makes love making and reading resemble each other most is that within both of them times and spaces open, different from measurable time and space»”
Italo Calvino (1923–1985) first seen 1981 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: If on a winter's night a traveller". Chapter 7. Translated from the Italian by William Weaver (1981).
“If one wanted to depict the whole thing graphically, every episode, with its climax, would require a three-dimensional, or, rather, no model: every experience is unrepeatable. What makes lovemaking and reading resemble each other most is that within both of them times and spaces open, different from measurable time and space.”
Italo Calvino (1923–1985) said by 1985 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reading is going toward something that is about to be, and no one yet knows what it will be.”
Italo Calvino (1923–1985) said by 1985 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break I got. Yet today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. I have been in ballparks for 17 years, and I have never received anything but kindness and encouragement from you fans. Look at these grand men. Which of you wouldn't consider it the highlight of his career just to associate with them for even one day?”
Lou Gehrig (1903–1941) first seen 1939 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech made on Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day at Yankee at Yankee Stadium (July 4, 1939)