#reading

"In the case of good books, the point is not to see how many of them you can get through, but rather how many can get through to you."

"I love words. I crave descriptions that overwhelm my imagination with vivid detail. I dwell on phrases that make my heart thrum. I cherish expressions that pierce my emotions and force the tears to spill over. In essence, I long for a writer's soul sealed in ink on the page."

"I’ll bet opening a store called Boobs and Books would increase literacy. I prefer a hands-on approach to learning."

"What kind of life can you have in a house without books?"

"There is a line of poetry, a sentence in a fable, a word in an essay, by which my existence is justified; find that line, and immortality is assured."

"...to her all books were the same and, as with her subjects, she felt a duty to approach them without prejudice...Lauren Bacall, Winifred Holtby, Sylvia Plath - who were they? Only be reading could she find out."

"No one knows as well as I how much nonsense is printed in books."

"Read to escape reality . . . Write to embrace it."

"The Prince came to give life unto those whose lives were almost being snuffed out by the devil via the cares of this world."

"Tis the good reader that makes the good book; in every book he finds passages which seem confidences or asides hidden from all else and unmistakenly meant for his ear; the profit of books is according to the sensibility of the reader; the profoundest thought or passion sleeps as in a mine, until it is discovered by an equal mind and heart."

"It's a rare book that wins the battle against drooping eyelids."

"When I was in my twenties and broke, I'd buy books before food. A meal will sustain you for a few hours, a good book will sustain you for life."

"People don't read any more. It's a sad state of affairs. Reading's the only thing that allows you to use your imagination. When you watch films it's someone else's vision, isn't it?"[Interview in The Independent, 15 October 2005]"

"Do not, under any circumstances, belittle a work of fiction by trying to turn it into a carbon copy of real life; what we search for in fiction is not so much reality but the epiphany of truth."

"A half-read book is a half-finished love affair."

"At the end of the day your ability to connect with your readers comes down to how you make them feel."

"Stranger, pause and look;From the dust of agesLift this little book,Turn the tattered pages,Read me, do not let me die!Search the fading letters findingSteadfast in the broken bindingAll that once was I!"

"My advice to aspiring writers is to read more, write more, and network more. More, more, and more. Then, after you've done all that, do it some more."

"God rewards every act of obedience to His Will."

"I regained my soul through literature after those times I'd lost it to wild-eyed gypsy girls on the European streets."