“Poetry is the one place where people can speak their original human mind. It is the outlet for people to say in public w...”

“When you sell a man a book you don’t sell him just 12 ounces of paper and ink and glue—you sell him a whole new life.”

“When I read Shakespeare I am struck with wonder that such trivial people should muse and thunder in such lovely language...”

“Great novels are above all great fairy tales . . . literature does not tell the truth but makes it up.”

“Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one's hand.”

“A book is no mere book anymore than man can be mere man. A book was like an individual man, unmatched and with no cause...”

“She read books as one would breathe air, to fill up and live.”

“A library outranks any other one thing a community can do to benefit its people. It is a never failing spring in the des...”

“Literature is the most agreeable way of ignoring life.”

“A room without books is like a body without a soul.”

“What people value in their books—and thus what they count as literature—really tells you more about them than it does ab...”

“You'll never be alone if you’ve got a book.”