Unread Books Quotes

Unread books are like unopened doors. ~ Thomas F. Shubnell

For the last several days I've had the sudden and general urge to buy a new book. I've stopped off at a few bookstores around the city, and while I've looked at hundreds and hundreds of books in that time, I have not found the one book that will satisfy my urge. It's not as if I don't have anything to read; there's a tower of perfectly good unread books next to my bed, not to mention the shelves of books in the living room I've been meaning to reread. I find myself, maddeningly, hungry for the next one, as yet unknown. I no longer try to analyze this hunger; I capitulated long ago to the book lust that's afflicted me most of my life. I know enough about the course of the disease to know I'll discover something soon. ~ Lewis Buzbee

The library sucked up sound like a vacuum. All of those thousands and thousands of unread books sucking up secrets for the last hundred years and no one would ever know ~ Michael Sears

An unread book does nobody any good. Stories happen in the mind of a reader, not among symbols printed on a page. ~ Brandon Mull

How many books do you have here?" Corliss asked. "Two million, one hundred thousand, and eleven," the librarian said proudly, but Corliss was frightened. What happens to the world when that many books go unread? And what happens to the unread authors of those unread books? ~ Sherman Alexie

A bizarrerie of fires, cunabulum of light, it moved with a deft, almost dainty deliberation, phasing into and out of existence like a storm-shot piece of evening; or perhaps the darkness between the flares was more akin to its truest nature swirl of black ashes assembled in prancing cadence to the lowing note of desert wind down the arroyo behind buildings as empty yet filled as the pages of unread books or stillnesses between the notes of a song. ~ Roger Zelazny

Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. ~ Nassim Nicholas Taleb

She thought of the library, so shining white and new; the rows and rows of unread books; the bliss of unhurried sojourns there and of going out to a restaurant, alone, to eat. ~ Maud Hart Lovelace

He is no true reader who has not experienced the reproachful fascination of the great shelves of unread books, of the libraries at night of which Borges is the fabulist. He is no reader who has not heard, in his inward ear, the call of the hundreds of thousands, of the millions of volumes which stand in the stacks of the British Library asking to be read. For there is in each book a gamble against oblivion, a wager against silence, which can be won only when the book is opened again (but in contrast to man, the book can wait centuries for the hazard of resurrection.) ~ George Steiner

The truly cultured are capable of owning thousands of unread books without losing their composure or their desire for more. ~ Gabriel Zaid

I am not by any stretch of the imagination a tidy person, and the piles of unread books on the coffee table and by my bed have a plaintive, pleading quality to me - 'Read me, please!' ~ Linda Grant

it seems to me that people have far more unread books than they once did, ranging from three to more than forty. ~ Marie Kondo

The history that lies inert in unread books does no work in the world. ~ Carl Becker

Her eyes went to the shelves that stretched up to within a few inches of the ceiling. All four walls were covered; piles of books stood here and there, teetering, vulnerable, she judged, to the slightest footfall. "But who doesn't have a lot of unread books? It's nice, though, just to know that they're there." He ~ Alexander McCall Smith

There was that special smell made up of paper, ink, and dust; the busy hush; the endless luxury of thousands of unread books. Best of all was the eager itch of anticipation as you went out the door with your arms loaded down with books. ~ Zilpha Keatley Snyder

He wondered what percentage of the world's art was actually kept in bank vaults and the like. Like unread books and unplayed music, did it matter that art went unseen? ~ Ian Rankin

If you missed your chance to read a particular book, even if it was recommended to you or is one you have been intending to read for ages, this is your chance to let it go. You may have wanted to read it when you bought it, but if you haven't read it by now, the book's purpose was to teach you that you didn't need it. There's no need to finish reading books that you only got halfway through. Their purpose was to be read halfway. So get rid of all those unread books. It ~ Marie Kondo

A library of mostly unread books is far more inspiring than a library of books already read. There's nothing more exciting than finishing a book, and walking over to your shelves to figure out what you're going to read next.
[The Wonderful and Terrible Habit of Buying Too Many Books, PWxyz (news blog of Publishers Weekly), February 16th, 2012] ~ Gabe Habash

Every new book we read in our brief and busy lives means that a classic is left unread. ~ B.R. Myers

Like all collectors, I exist in a perpetual state of want that bears no reasonable relationship to the quantity of unread books mounting up on my shelves. ~ Pamela Paul

It's not as if I don't have anything to read; there's a tower of perfectly good unread books next to my bed, not to mention the shelves of books in the living room I've been meaning to reread. I find myself, maddeningly, hungry for the next one, as yet unknown. I no longer try to analyze this hunger; I capitulated long ago to the book lust that's afflicted me most of my life. ~ Lewis Buzbee

Rip her dress off!" Bob shouted. Bob the Skull takes paperback romances very seriously. The next page turned so quickly that he tore the paper a little. Bob is even harder on books than I am.
"That's what I'm talking about!" Bob hollered, as more pages turned. ~ Jim Butcher

The worst part of writing is meeting all these great new characters and having no one to talk about (the adventures you share with) them. ~ Claudia Bakker

It is astonishing how many books I find there is no need for me to read at all. ~ W. Somerset Maugham

I have three storage units, and that's no lie. Three storage units. All books. ~ Junot Diaz

Clothing left on the bed unfolded. Books stained with coffee spots. Tabs not paid until the last possible second. Boys kissed and then forgotten in a week's time. ~ Libba Bray

It's exciting to watch young children read poetry for the first time. You can sense the wheels turning and you just know their brain is doing this wonderful thing called learning. It's magical! ~ Elaine Grey

Negative humor is forgotten immediately. It's the stuff that makes us feel better about our lives that lives long. Much more satisfying. Enter children's books. ~ Berkeley Breathed

I just knew there were stories I wanted to tell. ~ Octavia E. Butler

The business is a simple one. Hiro gets information. It may be gossip,
videotape, audiotape, a fragment of a computer disk, a xerox of a document. It
can even be a joke based on the latest highly publicized disaster.
He uploads it to the CIC database -- the Library, formerly the Library of
Congress, but no one calls it that anymore. Most people are not entirely clear
on what the word "congress" means.
And even the word "library" is getting hazy. It used to be a place full of
books, mostly old ones. Then they began to include videotapes, records, and
magazines. Then all of the information got converted into machine-readable
form, which is to say, ones and zeroes. And as the number of media grew, the
material became more up to date, and the methods for searching the Library
became more and more sophisticated, it approached the point where there was no
substantive difference between the Library of Congress and the Central
Intelligence Agency. Fortuitously, this happened just as the government was
falling apart anyway. So they merged and kicked out a big fat stock offering. ~ Neal Stephenson

Do not criticise others, for all doctrines and all dogmas are good; but show them by your lives that religion is no matter of books and beliefs, but of spiritual realisation. ~ Swami Vivekananda

With my earlier books, I got quite bored being with one protagonist all the way through. With the Alex Morrow books, I wanted to do something a bit more holistic, so there were lots of different points of view, and I wanted to look at aspects of crime that you don't tend to look at. ~ Denise Mina

If you're going to do something, DO IT.
If you want something, GET IT.
Don't just wish for it!
--- Mary Lynn H. Plaisance ~ Mary Lynn Plaisance

Love is like jumping off a cliff, even when you know you're acrophobic. ~ Lark Books

I'm not as well read as I was when I was younger - I just devoured books. ~ Pete Wentz

She once said, 'I'm really a little prudish, which people may think incongruous'. I take a prudish point of view on certain films, books, and trends. Then, I pull myself up short and ask myself how Gypsy Rose Lee could possibly be this way.I thought that quote was so telling, a key insight into the way she so carefully separated who she was from her meticulous creation. ~ Karen Abbott

Contrary to popular belief, editors and agents are gagging for good books. ~ Meg Rosoff

I have Black guys who tell me they put my books on their bed stands to read at night like something for guidance or information. That really pleases me a lot. I think my work has changed some things. It's changed me. ~ Ishmael Reed

It would be a narrow conception of jurisprudence to confine the notion of 'laws' to what is found written on the statute books, and to disregard the gloss which life has written upon it. ~ Felix Frankfurter

If you genuinely believe that only the death of a loved one can motivate a human being to take up a cause ... then get your pathetic, cynical ass out of my way so I can do my job! ~ Mark Waid

Nor would I willingly miss the early darkness and the pleasant firelight tea and the long evenings among my books. ~ Elizabeth Von Arnim

Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask for anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly. Love, truth, beauty, wisdom and consolation against death. Who had said that? someone else who loved books. ~ Cornelia Funke

As for my writing process, there is one truth I have discovered after writing some twenty-plus books: Not every book is the same, but the middle of every book is where I really begin to question my choice of vocations. The beginning and end is usually fairly clear to me, but that middle just sucks the life right out of me. ~ Julia London

In a book, all would have gone according to plan ... but life was so fucking untidy - what could you say for an existence where some of the most crucial conversations of your life took place when you needed to take a shit, or something? An existence where there weren't even any chapters? ~ Stephen King

I still get plenty anxious. The weird thing, and the unpleasant surprise for me, of proceeding well into the middle, perhaps even post-prime of my career is that writing books has not got any easier. And that doesn't seem fair. I mean, I've been doing it so surely I should be getting better at it, at least a little bit blasé... And it seems to be working absolutely the opposite. This book [Big Brother] I had no confidence in the entirety of its composition, and I only decided I liked it when I finished the very final draft. This means I'm in a state of semi-misery for a long time. And I can't blithely seem either that's some little game I'm playing with myself because, you know, you can easily come along and you don't like what's you're writing for good reason. Right? So, yeah, it's very anxious making, I don't think it's so much the becoming a little more successful, I think it's becoming slightly more aware of how much has already been written, and just becoming less self-impressed as the years go by. More impressed with some people who are better than I am, but... It doesn't wow me that I can write a sentence any more. It has to be a really good sentence. And... I think that's what potentially leads to paralysis in late career, is a kind of killing humility.


Politics & Prose Bookstore in Washington, DC, on June 11, 2013 ~ Lionel Shriver

Insecure managers create complexity. Frightened, nervous managers use thick convoluted planning books and busy slides filled with everything they've known since childhood ... ... . They worry that if they're simple, people will think they're simple minded. In reality, of course, it's just the reverse. Clear, tough minded people are the most simple. ~ Jack Welch

He felt about books as doctors feel about medicines, or managers about plays
cynical but hopeful. ~ Rose Macaulay

I remember when I was very young, I had a fever - a long rheumatic fever in bed for four months. And in the days, I stayed alone with the maid. I only had my father's books with me. They were fantasy books about ghosts, and also books by Edgar Allen Poe that made a forever impression on me. ~ Dario Argento

The closest to my heart is not just one book - it's the whole series of novels, Indigo Diaries. The first volume, "Gods' Food," is already available in English. ~ Sahara Sanders

You can cover a great deal of country in books. ~ Andrew Lang

My Man

It cost me a lot
But there's one thing that I've got
It's my man
It's my man

Cold or wet
Tired, you bet
All of this I'll soon forget
With my man

He's not much on looks
He's no hero out of books
But I love him
Yes, I love him

Two or three girls
Has he
That he likes as well as me
But I love him

I don't know why I should
He isn't true
He beats me, too
What can I do?

Oh, my man, I love him so
He'll never know
All my life is just a spare
But I don't care
When he takes me in his arms
The world is bright
All right

What's the difference if I say
I'll go away
When I know I'll come back
On my knees someday

For whatever my man is
I'm his forevermore ~ Billie Holiday

Art books are filled with interesting images. And that's cool and all, but I look more for the nudes. ~ Jarod Kintz

The best trust you can ever give to your children is financial literacy ~ Mac Duke The Strategist

John stuart mill knew several languages, advanced math and read many great books' before he was ten years old. his father taught him. in his early twenties he had a nervous breakdown and didn't leave his bed for three years. he read poetry and at started to feel better. he was a feminist and cared about human rights. five people went to his funeral ~ Megan Boyle

Excellence is THE trend of the '80s. Walk into any shopping mall bookstore, go to the rack where they keep the best-sellers such as Garfield Gets Spayed, and you'll see a half-dozen books telling you how to be excellent: In Search of Excellence, Finding Excellence, Grasping Hold of Excellence, Where to Hide Your Excellence at Night So the Cleaning Personnel Don't Steal It, etc. ~ Dave Barry

It's good to have these stories in our holy books, to remind us that they were written by humans. Filthy-minded, morally ambiguous humans. ~ Suzanne Morrison

-You've got a ... Lot of books, he said at last.
-it's a sickness.
-Are you ... Seeing anyone for it?
-I'm afraid it's untreatable.
-is this the ... Dewey decimal system?
-No. But it's based on similar principles. Those are the British novelists. The French are in the kitchen. Homer, Virgil, and the other epics are by the tub.
-I take it the ... Transcendental its do better in the sunlight.
-Exactly.
-Do they need much water?
-Not as much as you think. But lots of pruning.
He pointed the volume toward a pile of books under my bed.
-And the ... Mushrooms?
-The Russians.
-Ah.
-Who's winning?
-Not me. ~ Amor Towles

After all, I believe it is the style of thought entirely, and the style of expression, which makes the difference in books. ~ Henry David Thoreau

It's very important not to talk down to kids, and to give them something which they think is quite grown-up and hardcore. Kids themselves are very good at self-censoring. If they don't like something, if they think it's too strong for them, they'll simply stop reading. That's the thing about a book, you can't force someone to read it ... I think there's a lot in my books about friendship, leadership, about society and how it works, how we learn to live with each other and what skills do we need to make a viable society. Kids don't need to know any of that, they just want someone to be eaten again. ~ Charlie Higson

You really have a thing for books." When I didn't respond, he closed the the laptop without touching it. "It's cute. ~ Jennifer L. Armentrout

New Rule: I don't give two fingleberries and a McShit-all that Dumbledore is gay. I never wanted to know who Dumbledore was in the first place. Let alone his sexuality. What concerns me is adults who read 800-page books about magic schoolboys ... and then try to talk to me about it. If I had the slightest interest in homosexuals with powers, I'd be a Republican. ~ Bill Maher