May I a small house and large garden have;
And a few friends, and many books, both true,
Both wise, and both delightful too!

Abraham Cowley

What one reads becomes part of what one sees and feels.

Ralph Ellison

I have sometimes dreamt that when the Day of Judgement dawns and the great conquerors come to receive their rewards - their crowns, their laurels, their names carved indelibly upon imperishable marble - the Almighty will turn to Peter and will say, not without a certain envy when he sees us coming with our books under our arms, "Look, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading."

Virginia Woolf

Without words, without writing and without books there would be no history, there could be no concept of humanity.

Hermann Hesse

Books are where things are explained to you. Life is where things are not.

Julian Barnes