#libraries

"anyone who’s worth anything reads just what he likes, as the mood takes him, and with extravagant enthusiasm."

"Libraries should be open to all - except the censor.[Response to questionnaire in Saturday Review, October 29 1960]"

"I don't believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don't have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was during the Depression and we had no money. I couldn't go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years."

"Libraries store the energy that fuels the imagination. They open up windows to the world and inspire us to explore and achieve, and contribute to improving our quality of life. Libraries change lives for the better."

"Don't mark up the Library's copy, you fool! Librarians are Unprankable. They'll track you down! They have skills!"

"If your library is not "unsafe,"it probably isn't doing its job."

"What a school thinks about its library is a measure of what it feels about education."

"I don’t think people realise how vital libraries are or what a colossal danger it would be if we were to lose any more. Having had a truncated school life myself, all of my education from the age of 17 has been self-taught. I wouldn’t be the person I am today if it wasn’t for the opportunities the library gave me."

"There were two sets of double doors leading out of the antechamber, one marked STACKS and the other TOMES. Not knowing the difference between the two, I headed to the ones labeled STACKS. That was what I wanted. Stacks of books. Great heaps of books. Shelf after endless shelf of books."

"Don't join the book burners. Don't think you're going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don't be afraid to go in your library and read every book..."

"Shelving books incorrectly is as good as stealing them. It's almost worse."

"What is more important to a library than anything else -- than everything else -- is the fact that it exists."[The Premise Of Meaning, American Scholar; Washington, DC, June 5, 1972]"

"Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation."

"Ultimately, the number of books always exceeds the space they are granted."

"Libraries were full of ideas–perhaps the most dangerous and powerful of all weapons."

"Epics are never written about libraries. They exist on whim; it depends on if the conquering army likes to read."

"The acquisition of a book signalled not just the potential acquisition of knowledge but also something like the property rights to a piece of ground: the knowledge became a visitable place."

"I like libraries. It makes me feel comfortable and secure to have walls of words, beautiful and wise, all around me. I always feel better when I can see that there is something to hold back the shadows."

"In my fool hardy youth, when my friends were dreaming of heroic deeds in the realms of engineering and law, finance and national politics, I dreamt of becoming a librarian."

"There are many horrible sights in the multiverse. Somehow, though, to a soul attuned to the subtle rhythms of a library, there are few worse sights than a hole where a book ought to be.Someone had stolen a book."