More than Just a Rating discussion

I was inspired by A Book Addict's Treasury, but of course we can get quotations from any source to share here. To start things off, consider:

"As a rule a bookshop is horribly cold in winter, because if it is too warm the windows get misted over, and a bookseller lives on his windows. And books give off more and nastier dust than any other class of objects yet invented, and the top of a book is the place where every bluebottle prefers to die."
George Orwell Bookshop memories (1936)

"It's against my principles to buy a book I haven't read, it's like buying a dress you haven't tried on."
Helene Hanff, letter to Frank Doel, 9 February 1952

Cheryl in CC NV wrote: ""It's against my principles to buy a book I haven't read, it's like buying a dress you haven't tried on."
Helene Hanff, letter to Frank Doel, 9 February 1952"

Gosh I love this one! That's why I have over 3k books lined up in my Kindles. Once I do find I love a former freebie I often by it and the rest of the series.

Cheryl in CC NV wrote: ""As a rule a bookshop is horribly cold in winter, because if it is too warm the windows get misted over, and a bookseller lives on his windows. And books give off more and nastier dust than any ot..."

My music books show that they caught even more dust and flies than my other books. Still I love those spotty, dusty, yellow pieces of trees!

Aww... Thanks for sharing!

"I am not at all afraid of urging overmuch the propriety of frequent, very frequent, reading of the same book. The book remains the same, but the reader changes."
Matthew Browne On the forming of opinions on books (1866)

"SID: Good is it?

HANCOCK: This is red hot this is mate. I'd hate to think of a book like this getting into the wrong hands. As soon I've finished this I shall recommend they ban it."

Alan Simpson and Ray Galton, Hancock's Half Hour: The Missing Page (1960)

"... give me a small snug place, almost entirely walled with books. There should be only one window in it, looking upon trees."
Leigh Hunt, My Books (1823)

"There have indeed been minds overlaid by much reading, men who have piled such a load of books on their heads, their brains seem to be squashed by them."
A.W. and J.C. Hare, Guesses at Truth (1827)

"Literature, as I saw it then, was a vast open range, my equivalent of the cowboy's dream. I felt free as any nomad to roam where I pleased, amid the wild growth of books. Eventually I formed my own book herds and brought them into more or less orderly systems of pasturage. I even branded them with a bookplate that had once been the family brand: s stirrup drawn simply and elegantly by my father."
Larry McMurtry, Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen (1999)

"Almost seventy years later I remember clearly how the magic of translating the words in books into images enriched my life, breaking the barriers of time and space..."
Mario Vargas Llosa

“Aziraphale collected books. If he were totally honest with himself he would have to have admitted that his bookshop was simply somewhere to store them. He was not unusual in this. In order to maintain his cover as a typical second-hand book seller, he used every means short of actual physical violence to prevent customers from making a purchase. Unpleasant damp smells, glowering looks, erratic opening hours - he was incredibly good at it.”
― Terry Pratchett, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

Good one! Thank you.

"You read a lot," said the behatted kvetch indicating the two novels he had open. He nodded, because there was no denying it and he didn't want to put up the ante for a conversation."
"Books aren't life."
"No, they're better," he replied and flipped through the thirty-two library cards in his wallet to remove his one credit card to pay.

Tibor Fischer, *Bookcruncher*

... you may be strenuously advised to keep reading. Any good book, any book that is wiser than yourself, will teach you something -- a great many things, directly and indirectly, if your mind be open to learn.

Thomas Carlyle (1843)

But what about this? Do you agree?
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If the reading of good books is ever sinful, it is at meal-times. He who reads at meal-times treats his meal and his digestion with discourtesy, and put upon his author the affront of a divided allegiance.

Robert Blatchford (1900)
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Well, I see the point. But I can't say I'll give up the habit entirely. What about you?

When I'm eating alone (which is most of the time), I find that reading while I eat slows me down so that I actually have better digestion. If I don't read while I eat, I eat too rapidly so I can get back to reading. I have just taken a half hour to eat breakfast while reading and writing posts. If I only ate breakfast, I would be eating breakfast in a couple of minutes and having acid indigestion.

Hah! Excellent point! Thank you.

... there are some publishers whom I refuse to collect, because all their novels look alike, and destroy my collection of a book-shelf, which should be a mass of gaudy variety.

Cyril Connolly (1945)

Well, Cyril oughta be delighted with my shelves, then!

The world may be divided into people that read, people that write, people that think, and fox-hunters.

William Shenstone (1769)

It would be a good thing to buy books if one could also buy the time to read them; but one usually confuses the purchase of books with the acquisition of their contents.

Arthur Schopenhauer (1851)

Oh, goodness, is this ever true for me!

Libraries are reservoirs of strength, grace and wit, reminders of order, calm and continuity, lakes of mental energy, neither warm nor cold, light nor dark. The pleasure they give is steady, unorgastic, reliable, deep and long-lasting.

Germaine Greer (1990)

In order to read what is good one must make it a condition never to read what is bad; for life is short and both time and strength limited.

Arthur Schopenhauer (1851)

I am not at all afraid of urging overmuch the propriety of ...[re]reading.... The book remains the same, but the reader changes.

Matthew Browne (1866)

A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little good.

Samuel Johnson (1791)

He who loves to commune with books is led to detest all manner of vice.

Richard de Bury (1599)

Ok, that's all the quotations from the book that I like and that are short enough to copy down here. I'd love to now pass this book on to one of you. Please, if you live in the US, send me your snail mail address in a PM and let me give it to you.