4,370 Quotes About Literature

…Shakespeare is both my door knocker and the owner of the domains to which the knock admits me, at once my Virgil opening the gates of hell and heaven, and the devil, and God, and I say this as a person who believes in neither God nor the devil, I believe only in Virgil…

The key to other worlds, doors to other people and experiences, pathways to understanding the world.

To me, literature is a calling, even a kind of salvation. It connects me with an enterprise that is over 2,000 years old. What do we have from the past? Art and thought. That’s what lasts. That’s what continues to feed people and give them an idea of something better.

Beauty is scandalous sir! It takes away a man's reason and cedes him unreasonable fervor. For you see sir! A man profligate as me; has found in this destitutionthat a reasonable man is more likely to lead acontent life. That's the best a man can be sir, content.Especially an eternally dejected man, such as myself.Who has lost his ability to be pleased.

It's amazing how, age after age, in country after country, and in all languages, Shakespeare emerges as incomparable.

To my fellow writers' I say, 'Write. Build an imaginary world like nobody's watching.

Basically, if the author is totally un-educated, then the text won't bring out his best. Normal, educated people always understand that. But here's the thing—when the author is very highly-educated, the result is the same: the text turns out sub-par. Like if Charybdis was an uneducated cannibal, and Scylla was a sophisticated gourmand.Real literature snakes between the two. Like Hera's hair.

This town of churches and dreams; this town I thought I would lose myself in, with its backward ways and winding roads leading to nowhere; but, I found myself instead. -Magic in the Backyard (excerpt from American Honey)

Courage is more important than to be deceived by shallow victory waiting for a delayed defeat.