Book Quotes - Page 655

I am beguiled by your physical beauty, and I am moved by how head-over-heels in love with books you are. And nowhere else have I found such thoughtful and literate reportage on the state of the American soul, as that soul makes itself known in the books we write.

There is this thing called the university, and everybody goes there now. And there are these things called teachers who make students read this book with good ideas or that book with good ideas until that's where we get our ideas. We don't think them; we read them in books. I like Utopian talk, speculation about what our planet should be, anger about what our planet is. I think writers are the most important members of society, not just potentially but actually. Good writers must have and stand by their own ideas.

The book was Maniacs in the Fourth Dimension, by Kilgore Trout. It was about people whose mental diseases couldn't be treated because the causes of the diseases were all in the fourth dimension, and three-dimensional Earthling doctors couldn't see those causes at all, or even imagine them.

But by accident, not by cunning calculation, books, because of their weight and texture, and because of their sweetly token resistance to manipulation, involve our hands and eyes, and then our minds and souls, in a spiritual adventure I would be very sorry for my grandchildren not to know about.

When I was working on my career, I was very aware of what I had done, what I wanted to do next. I'm having a good time just reading things that might be interesting to do.

I am not read well, but when I do read, I read well.

If I won the lottery tomorrow - which would be a real trick, since I haven't entered - and was independently wealthy for the rest of my life, I'd write comic books, because it's what I like doing.

I think James Bond is a spy. He's not superhuman. Calling him a superhero is like calling James Bond movies "comic-book movies."

The Social License is fundamentally about accountability to people and not just powerful interests. John Morrison’s book reminds all organizations – governments, business and civil society – to focus on the legitimacy of their own actions.

The hallmark of my books is the relationships that define women's lives.

Hands down, the hardest part for me is coming up with an idea. I spend about 14 months writing a book, and that's a lot of hours spent thinking about a single project. I simply have to love the idea. I'll go through dozens of workable ideas until I find the one that lights my fire.

I am not really interested in the comic book movies for example. They send me very violent scripts that don't interest me. One I was sent involved me playing a woman, a mother and wife who gets killed, shot in the stomach. It was a thriller and it did not excite me at all. So I turned it down.

Someone gave me the Love Languages book, and that has been the best book I've ever read about relationships and has helped me the most.

I don’t often know who should read what book. It’s a little bit like trying to set people up on a date - a good match is unpredictable and mysterious.

I don't understand your book. Isn't every book a book of words?

A book that bores me to tears is a book that neglects character building and quality of prose.

Teddy grinned again. 'Truths are dangerous,' he said. -'Then why are you writing them in a book?' -'To catch them between the pages,' said Teddy, 'and trap them before they disappear.' -'If they're dangerous, why not let them disappear?' -'Because when truths disappear, they leave behind blank spaces, and that is also dangerous.

I’m suspicious of the notion of a single book that would benefit everyone to read.

I have always heard that uber-successful people who write books about how to become uber-successful all have one thing in common: They all meditate every day. I consider yoga my meditation.

I just want the fans of the book to be happy. I don't necessarily care about anyone else.

Robert Scott Leyse channels Baudelaire's Queen of Spades and Jack of Hearts, speaking darkly of dead loves, in this new book. He also reminds me of James Purdy's notorious eccentricity. There's plenty of middlebrow stuff if you want it. Self-Murder isn't that.

I love to read books that focus on parenting topics because there are so many different ways to do things. I find these books offer a lot of great opinions on many different subjects.

I make the case in the book that Standard English, that language we all aspire to live and move and have our being within, is actually based on a fiction. It's not anyone's native way of speaking or writing. That's why we have to take classes in it. Language is just really squishy.

My autobiography is one of the truest, most frankly written books ever published in the western hemisphere.

That [Louisiana culture] was all very new to me. I read books and watched documentaries, just trying to immerse myself.