From fire, water, the passage of time, neglectful readers, and the hand of the censor, each of my books has escaped to tell me its story.

Every reader exists to ensure for a certain book a modest immortality. Reading is, in this sense, a ritual of rebirth.

The love of libraries, like most loves, must be learned.

If justice takes place, there may be hope, even in the face of a seemingly capricious divinity.

One book calls to another unexpectedly, creating alliances across different cultures and centuries.

Deserted libraries hold the shades of writers who worked within, and are haunted by their absence.

Entering a library, I am always stuck by the way in which a certain vision of the world is imposed upon the reader through its categories and its order.

I like to imagine that, on the day after my last, my library and I will crumble together, so that even when I am no more I'll still be with my books.

Ultimately, the number of books always exceeds the space they are granted.

Unpacking books is a revelatory activity.

If every library is in some sense a reflection of its readers, it is also an image of that which we are not, and cannot be.

Desire is half of life

Ignorance is the root of many ills. Knowledge must be the fundamental ally of nations that aspire, despite all their tragedies and problems, to become truly emancipated, to build a better world.

Just because someone has been in your life for many years, doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be a point at which you finally decide to let go.

Ignorance is the greatest slave master in the universe.

The good man is he for whom, because he is virtuous, the things that are absolutely good are good; it is also plain that his use of these goods must be virtuous and in the absolute sense good.

A wise man in his house should find a wife gentle and courteous, or no wife at all.

If you think your picture needs something, take something out.

Hitch was interested in what I had to offer, like one of my background ideas for Norman's upbringing.

Great loves were almost always great tragedies. Perhaps it was because love was never truly great until the element of sacrifice entered into it.

Nobody had a credit card when I was a kid. No one had credit card debt. But these big companies and banks wanted to know how to get more money out of people - get them charging things.