A place of refuge…
“This is a library. A place of refuge. Libraries should be full of dusty old books and nooks and corners and places to hide away in.”
— Edward Ferrars, Sense and Sensibility (2008)
Remember Your Favorite Teacher? Today’s a Good Day to Say Thank You
Read more here.
I’d like to take this opportunity to mention my junior high (or rather the Swedish equivalent) French and English teacher. He was awesome. We had so much fun the three years he taught us French and English. Just to mention one thing, one day per week we got to just ‘play’ with the language – making collages. Thank you very much, sir. It was great being your student.
The Bookshop…
The Bookshop has a thousand books,
All colors, hues, and tinges,
And every cover is a door
That turns on magic hinges.
– Nancy Byrd Turner
Read…
“Read. Read. Read. Just don’t read one type of book. Read different books by various authors so that you develop different styles.”
– R.L. Stine
Good reader…
“Tis the good reader that makes the good book.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
The sorcery of books…
That is the sorcery of books…. All people can be wise by reading of books.”
– Puck of Pook’s Hill, Rudyard Kipling
Advice for writers
To observe the world carefully, to write a lot and often, on a schedule if necessary, to use the dictionary a lot, to look up word origins, to analyze closely the work of writers you admire, to read not only contemporaries but writers of the past, to learn at least one foreign language, to live an interesting life outside of writing.
—
Lydia Davis when asked what advice she has for young writers
Quote from Jane Austen
“It is very unfair to judge of anybody’s character without an intimate knowledge of their situation.”
– Jane Austen (Emma)
Books…
For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die.
—Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott
Explaining too much…
When a writer tries to explain too much, he’s out of time before he begins.
Isaac Bashevis Singer
