If every library is in some sense a reflection of its reader... - Alberto Manguel, The Library at Night
"If every library is in some sense a reflection of its readers, it is also an image of that which we are not, and cannot be."
More quotes by Alberto Manguel, The Library at Night
"Every reader exists to ensure for a certain book a modest immortality. Reading is, in this sense, a ritual of rebirth."
"In the dark, with the windows lit and the rows of books glittering, the library is a closed space, a universe of self-serving rules that pretend to replace or translate those of the shapeless universe beyond."
"I like to imagine that, on the day after my last, my library and I will crumble together, so that even when I am no more I'll still be with my books."
"Readers, censors know, are defined by the books they read."
"It hardly matters why a library is destroyed: every banning, curtailment, shredding, plunder or loot gives rise (at least as a ghostly presence) to a louder, clearer, more durable library of the banned, looted, plundered, shredded or curtailed."