In the light, we read the inventions of others; in the darkness we invent our own stories. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
In any of my pages in any of my books may life a perfect account of my secret experience of the world. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“... to lend a book is an incitement to theft." A Reader on Reading p. 281” — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
One book calls to another unexpectedly, creating alliances across different cultures and centuries. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
The association of books with their readers is unlike any other between objects and their users. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Reality deals in specifics under the guise of generalities. Literature does the contrary... — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
My books hold between their covers every story I've ever known and still remember, or have now forgotten, or may one day… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Socrates affirmed that only that which the reader already knows can be sparked by a reading, and that the knowledge cannot be… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Most readers, then and now, have at some time experienced the humiliation of being told that their occupation is reprehensible. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
This morning I looked at the books on my shelves and thought that they have no knowledge of my existence. They come… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“We read to understand our intuition of the world, to discover that someone a thousand miles and years away has put into… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
In every literate society, learning to read is something of an initiation, a ritualized passage out of a state of dependency and… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
The world that is a book is devoured bya reader who is a letter in the world's text; thus a circular metaphor… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
I enjoyed learning the poems, but I didn't understand of what use they might possibly be. ‘They'll keep you company on the… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
For Borges, the core of reality lay in books; reading books, writing books, talking about books. In a visceral way, he was… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
It has always been my experience that, whatever groupings I choose for my books, the space in which I plan to lodge… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Old or new, the only sign I always try to rid my books of (usually with little success) is the price-sticker that… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
The stories that unfold in the space of a writer's study, the objects chosen to watch over a desk, the books selected… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“One book calls to another unexpectedly, creating alliances across different cultures and centuries. A half-remembered line is echoed by another for reasons… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
As readers, we are seldom interested in the fine sentiments of a lesson learnt; we seldom care about the good manners of… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
At night, here in the library, the ghosts have voices… The various qualities of my readings seem to permeate my every muscle,… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
We can imagine the books we'd like to read, even if they have not yet been written, and we can imagine libraries… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“No one stepping for the first time into a room made of books can know instinctively how to behave, what is expected,… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“Libraries, whether my own or shared with a greater reading public, have always seemed to me pleasantly mad places, and for as… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“Outside theology and fantastic literature, few can doubt that the main features of our universe are its dearth of meaning and lack… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“Old books that we have known but not possessed cross our path and invite themselves over. New books try to seduce us… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“I think I read in at least two ways. First, by following, breathlessly, the events and the characters without stopping to notice… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“There is nothing,” Naudé wrote, “that renders a Library more recommendable, than when every man finds in it that which he is… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
“I don’t think that the definition of library has changed. Libraries have never been repositories solely of books. In Alexandria for instance,… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
We can roam the bloated stacks of the Library of Alexandria, where all imagination and knowledge are assembled; we can recognize in… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
The readers who commited suicide after reading 'Werther' were not ideal but merely sentimental readers. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Ultimately, the number of books always exceeds the space they are granted. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Books read in a public library never have the same flavour as books read in the attic or the kitchen. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share Image
Most readers, then and now, have at some time experienced the humiliation of being told that their occupation is reprehensible. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
Libraries, whether my own or shared with a greater reading public, have always seemed to me pleasantly mad places, and for as long as… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
At different times and in different places I have come to expect certain books to look a certain way, and, as in all fashions,… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
I have no feelings of guilt regarding the books I have not read and perhaps will never read; I know that my books have… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
“Then one day, from the window of a car (the destination of that journey is now forgotten), I saw a billboard by the side… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
The shelves of books we haven't written, like those of books we haven't read, stretches out into the darkness of the universal library's farthest… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
“I have no feeling of guilt regarding the books I have not read and perhaps will never read; I know that my books have… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
Old books that we have known but not possessed cross our path and invite themselves over. New books try to seduce us daily with… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
Ordered by subject, by importance, ordered according to whether the book was penned by God or by one of God's creatures, ordered alphabetically or… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
“Ljubav je imbecilna izvesnost pomoću koje naša fantazija stvara verodostojnu utvaru.” — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
I know that something dies when i give up my books, and that my memory keeps going back to them with mournful nostalgia. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
Something about the possession of a book - an object that can contain infinite fables, words of wisdom, chronicles of times gone by, humorous… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
Maybe this is why we read, and why in moments of darkness we return to books: to find words for what we already know. — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
As centuries of dictators have known, an illiterate crowd is the easiest to rule; since the craft of reading cannot be untaught once it… — Alberto Manguel Copy Share
