Books Quotes
Samuel Johnson is on this page more than once for good reason. In The Rambler (1750) he wrote that no place gives a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library. Boswell (1791) has him saying that a man ought to read just as inclination leads him, because what he reads as a task will do him little good. Alberto Manguel, Emerson and Northrop Frye are among the most-quoted writers here, which is what you would expect from people who spent their working lives reading.
Two entries are flagged as misattributed. The quip about a manuscript that is both good and original, with the good parts not original and the original parts not good, is credited to Johnson. “Rommel, you magnificent bastard! I read your book!” is credited to General Patton.
Wise friends are the best book of life, because they teach with voice and looks.
The grammarian Callimachus used to say that a big book is equivalent to a big evil.
It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book.
I'm the biggest nerd - I love comic books and stuff like that!
All good books have one thing in common — they are truer than if they had really happened.
That's a very good way to learn the craft of writing — from reading.
The Quantum Universe has a quotation from me in every chapter — but it's a damn good book anyway.
Literature is strewn with the wreckage of men who have minded beyond reason the opinions of others.
Books always cost more in those cities where they are least read!