TOP TEN TUESDAY | FAVOURITE QUOTES ABOUT BOOKS

This week’s prompt is inspiring or thought-provoking quotes. Which is a great topic, but I don’t write down quotes. I don’t even mark them in books. So while there have been many that have made me pause recently, I don’t have any way of finding them – other than re-reading all the books, which I wouldn’t mind doing except time. So instead, I’m sharing some of my favourite quotes about books and reading, because that’s better anyway.

“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, who had ever been alive.” – James Baldwin

“So many books, so little time” – Frank Zappa

“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” – Neil Gaiman, Coraline

“If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” – Toni Morrison

“She read books as one would breathe air, to fill up and live.” – Annie Dillard, The Living

“I do things like get in a taxi and say, ‘The library, and step on it.’” – David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest

“It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it.” – Oscar Wilde

“Books are a uniquely portable magic.” – Stephen King, On Writing

“A children’s story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children’s story in the slightest.” – C.S. Lewis

“I cannot sleep unless I am surrounded by books.” – Jorge Luis Borges

“Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore?” – Henry Ward Beecherr

“The library is inhabited by spirits that come out of the pages at night.” – Isabel Allende

“The best moments in reading are when you come across something – a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things – which you had thought special and particular to you. Now here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, someone even who is long dead. And it is as if a hand has come out and taken yours.” – Alan Bennett, The History Boys

“Think before you speak. Read before you think.” – Fran Lebowitz, The Fran Lebowitz Reader

“Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.” – George Bernard Shaw

“That’s the thing about books. They let you travel without moving your feet.” – Jhumpa Lahiri, The Namesake

I love all of these quotes, but the truth is I could have picked about a thousand other ones and loved them just as much. Writers are usually also readers, and they tend to write some of their best lines about that love of reading. If you want to lose several hours perusing great book quotes, check out this Goodreads list – it’s where I found a lot of these (though I already knew which I was looking for, this was just a handy round-up!). And I’d love to hear your quotes – either about books, or just about life in general! Share one of your favourites in the comments!

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly link-up feature created by The Broke and the Bookish and hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. Every week TTT has a different topic, and everyone who links up has to create a link of ten items that fit that topic. To see past and upcoming topics, go here.