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. 1,159,190 quotes Who coined it · How we decide

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Books and reading

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“The Venetians invented the income tax, statistical science, the floating of government stock, state censorship of books, anonymous denunciations (the Bocca del Leone), the gambling casino, and the Ghetto.”
Mary McCarthy (1912–1989) said by 1989 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“90% of the population is a fanatic […] Frank is a fanatic on keeping an open mind. […] Ahmed a doll. Fanaticism linked to abstinence. Abstinence from alcohol, tobacco, sex, forbidden books, forbidden thoughts. There's the distinction: H. and J. not madly tolerant but enjoy thinking, take pleasure in play of their minds.”
Mary McCarthy (1912–1989) said by 1989 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What is a great love of books? It is something like a personal introduction to the great and good men of all past times.”
John Bright (1811–1889) first seen 1882 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech in Birmingham Town Hall (1 June 1882), quoted in William Robertson, Life and Times of the Right Hon. John Bright (1883), p. 522. Variation in C. N. Douglas, Forty Thousand Quotations (1917): "What is a great love…
“Heroes in books should be so much better than heroes got up for the world's common wear and tear”
Anthony Trollope (1815–1882) said by 1882 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Against the wall, near the head of the bunk, was a rack filled with books. I glanced over them, noting with astonishment such names as Shakespeare, Tennyson, Poe, and De Quincey. There were scientific works too, among which were represented men such as Tyndall, Proctor, and Darwin.”
Jack London (1876–1916) said by 1916 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is a continent — Africa — being consumed by flames. I truly believe that when the history books are written, our age will be remembered for three things: the war on terror, the digital revolution, and what we did — or did not to — to put the fire out in Africa. History, like God, is watching what we do.”
Bono (born 1960) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No, but one can feel desperate at any age, don't you think? The young are eternally desperate," he said frankly. "And books, they offer one hope – that a whole universe might open up from between the covers, and falling into that universe, one is saved.”
Anne Rice (1941–2021) said by 2021 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There are noble books but one wants the breath of life sometimes. And I see no divine person. I myself am more divine than any I see — I think that is enough to say about them...”
Margaret Fuller (1810–1850) first seen 1838 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson (1 March 1838); published in The Letters of Margaret Fuller vol. I, p. 327, , edited by Robert N. Hudspeth (1983)
“Suppose I was researching, not the life of some genius philosopher with his books and articles and a wake of articulate friends and acquaintances, but rather, a homeless kid in and out of mental hospitals for chronic masturbation and indecent exposure?...How would I even start?”
Samuel R. Delany (born 1942) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This is an age that has produced floods of how-to-do-it books, and it is also an age of how-to-do-it science. It is, in other words, the age of technology, in which if we know how to do something, we do it without pausing to inquire whether we should.”
Rachel Carson (1907–1964) said by 1964 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As a kid growing up in the 1950s I became acutely aware of the changes taking place in American culture and I must say I didn't much like it. I witnessed the debasement of architecture, and I could see a decline in the quality of things like comic books and toys, things made for kids. Old things seemed to have more life, more substance, more humanity in them.”
Robert Crumb (born 1943) first seen 2005 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The R. Crumb Handbook by Robert Crumb and Peter Poplaski (2005), p. 23
“I have therefore thought that it would be a worthy and very useful thing to reduce the whole of this great art to a complete and orderly form of presentation, and then in different books to lay down and explain the required characteristics of different departments.”
Vitruvius (80–15 BC) said by 15 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Bedrooms and libraries ought to have an eastern exposure, because their purposes require the morning light, and also because books in such libraries will not decay.”
Vitruvius (80–15 BC) said by 15 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It was a wise and useful provision of the ancients to transmit their thoughts to posterity by recording them in treatises, so that they should not be lost, but, being developed in succeeding generations through publications in books, should gradually attain in later times, to the highest refinement of learning.”
Vitruvius (80–15 BC) said by 15 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Few men, whatever their creed, would now seek their geology in the books of their religion, or, on the other hand, would fancy that the laboratory or the microscope could help them to penetrate the mysteries which hang over the nature and the destiny of the soul of man. ... We live in a small, bright oasis of knowledge, surrounded on all sides by a vast, unexplored region of impenetrable mystery.”
Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) first seen 1894 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech to the British Association (6 August 1894), quoted in The Times (9 August 1894), p. 6
“When we are collecting books, we are collecting happiness.”
Vincent Starrett (1886–1974) said by 1974 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed to Starrett in Michael Dirda, On Conan Doyle: Or, The Whole Art of Storytelling (2012), page 112.
“Great is bookishness and the charm of books.”
Augustine Birrell (1850–1933) said by 1933 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Personally, I am dead against the burning of books.”
Augustine Birrell (1850–1933) said by 1933 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There were no books in Eden, and there will be none in heaven.”
Augustine Birrell (1850–1933) said by 1933 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“On airlines, so many passengers' faces are buried in John Grisham books, they could be complimentary copies for Grisham Airlines.”
Kate Clinton (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I'd like to work on having every fourth year become a year in which no laws are made, but the old laws are reviewed, updated, or deleted as needed. That way we won't get endless, obsolete laws piling up on the books.”
Jesse Ventura (born 1951) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Given how many convicts awaiting capital punishment have been cleared because of DNA evidence, I no longer support the death penalty. Minnesota doesn't have this on the books, so I'm thankful that, as governor, I never had to face the decision of whether to execute someone on death row. Again, I simply don't believe that government has the inherent right to make those kinds of choices.”
Jesse Ventura (born 1951) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I'm really interested with the way light plays on images and one of the artists that really reawakened my interest in comic books was Frank Miller and his treatment of Daredevil, and then Wolverine and, of course, Batman.”
James Marsters (born 1962) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What I intended to do was to burn a half dozen of my books and keep warm, so that I could write my story, but when I looked around for titles to burn, I couldn't find any.”
William Saroyan (1908–1981) said by 1981 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is much for a young writer to learn from our poorest writers. It is very destructive to burn bad books, almost more destructive than to burn good ones.”
William Saroyan (1908–1981) said by 1981 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Superstition lives longer than books, it is engraved on the human mind 'til it becomes a part of its existence.”
John Clare (1793–1864) said by 1864 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In books, or work, or healthful play, Let my first years be past, That I may give for every day Some good account at last.”
Isaac Watts (1674–1748) said by 1748 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I cannot write long books; I leave that for those who have nothing to say.”
Celia Green (born 1935) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[L]ook at yourself right now... hoping to lose yourself—your home, your certainties, the borders and boundaries of your life—by means of a bundle of wood pulp, sewn and glued and stained with blobs of pigment and resin. People with Books. … It makes me want to laugh.”
Michael Chabon (born 1963) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We men of study, whose heads are in our books, have need to be straitly looked after! We dream in our waking moments, and walk in our sleep.”
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–1864) said by 1864 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Why don’t you go somewhere quietly and consult your history books if you have no consciences to consult?”
Brian Aldiss (1925–2017) said by 2017 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You can't be a rascal for 40 years and then cop a plea the last minute. God keeps better books than that.”
Wilson Mizner (1876–1933) said by 1933 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted by Stuart B. McIver, Dreamers, Schemers and Scalawags, Pineapple Press, Sarasota, Florida, 1994. .
“In 'A Room of One's Own', Virginia Woolf satirically describes her perplexity at the bulging card catalog of the British Museum: why, she asks, are there so many books written by men about women but none by women about men? The answer to her question is that from the beginning of time men have been struggling with the threat of woman's dominance.”
Camille Paglia (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Beware of the manipulativeness of rich students who were neglected by their parents. They love to turn the campus into hysterical psychodramas of sexual transgression, followed by assertions of parental authority and concern. And don’t look for sexual enlightenment from academe, which spews out mountains of books but never looks at life directly.”
Camille Paglia (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Many, perhaps most, very learned people prefer the company of their books to sitting in a crowd listening to history and art being mangled; furthermore, it is unlikely that the venerable scholars will stand up afterward to declare, “This lecture was a load of crap.” The more profound a professor’s distaste with the proceedings, the more likely he is to melt away at the end of the talk.”
Camille Paglia (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I think intellectuals should be fascinated by my rise, what it reveals about the time. My critics are irrelevant, though. It tells how much I'm getting to them by how vitriolic they are. They refuse to deal with the ideas. But reviews don't reflect anything; the books are selling. A friend told me, "The attacks make you.”
Camille Paglia (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In a media age where books are no longer the primary medium for information storage and exchange, language must be reclaimed from the hucksters and the pedants and imaginatively reinforced. To save literature, educators must take command of the pre-rational world of images. The only antidote to the magic of images is the magic of words.”
Camille Paglia (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Everybody has only a 24-hour day. Most people, if they increase consumption of one medium (like magazines or books) will cut down on another (like TV). This drastically reduces the sort of growth some people have been expecting.”
Ted Nelson (born 1937) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Try to frequent the company of your betters. In books and life that is the most wholesome society; learn to admire rightly; the great pleasure of life is that. Note what the great men admired; they admired great things: narrow spirits admire basely, and worship meanly.”
William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–1863) said by 1863 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If a secret history of books could be written, and the author's private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader!”
William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–1863) said by 1863 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I've had enough of breakdowns and diagrams— Judging from picture books, apparently Heaven is a partly cloudy place.”
Jenny Lewis (born 1976) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When people ask me what I think is my best work, it's the bus. There're lots of books, but there's only one bus.”
Ken Kesey (1935–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We regard Judaism as a civilization, not just as a religion. I think there are many, many ways to be a Jew. And one of those ways to be a Jew is to be a nonreligious Jew. The heritage contains, first and foremost, books, texts, spiritual creativity. And religion is only one of the components of this magnificent heritage.”
Amos Oz (1939–2018) said by 2018 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I have only one certainty: there exists a parallel spiritual universe that impinges on the world in which we live. Apart from that, everything else seems absurd to me—sacred books, revelations, guides, manuals, ceremonies … and, what is worse, they appear to have no lasting effects.”
Paulo Coelho (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Torah study is an intellectual pursuit, and honoring this ultimate value transfers to other pursuits as well, Jewish homes are full of books while other homes may or may not be. Jewish homes have overflowing bookshelves. Throughout the generations we have given great honor to this intellectual pursuit…Torah study makes the nation and its people of the finest and highest quality.”
Robert Aumann (born 1930) first seen 2013 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Aumann said to Israel’s Army Radio. "Israel Today" israeltoday.co.il. December 03, 2013
“Nothing in the next-door world of Dachau impinged on the great winter cycle of Beethoven chamber music played in Munich. No canvases came off museum walls as the butchers strolled reverently past, guide-books in hand.”
George Steiner (1929–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Women began their inner emancipation by their access to literature, by access to the world through books; an access they could not have socially or politically, or of course economically, in the world at large.”
George Steiner (1929–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Thus they shall not miss this particular branch of the many branches of the Law and will have no need to roam and ramble about in other books in search of information on matters set forth in this treatise.”
Maimonides (1135–1204) said by 1204 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Mr. Hollis is always publishing republican books, and yet professes great veneration for our constitution. I cannot reconcile this; our constitution being, in its leading part, an oligarchy, the form, perhaps, of all others, the most opposite to a republic.”
Horace Walpole (1717–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“From what has been last said it follows, that the titles of the Canonical books, and their ascription to definite authors, either do not come under their inspiration, or need not be accepted literally.”
John Henry Newman (1801–1890) first seen 1884 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 'On the Inspiration of Scripture', The Nineteenth Century, No. 84 (February 1884), p. 196