When politicians and politically minded people pay too much attention to literature, it is a bad sign — a bad sign mostly for literature. But it is also a bad sign when they dont want to hear the word mentioned. – Italo Calvino
Everything can change, but not the language that we carry inside us, like a world more exclusive and final than ones mothers womb. – Italo Calvino
The city of cats and the city of men exist one inside the other, but they are not the same city. – Italo Calvino
The satirist is prevented by repulsion from gaining a better knowledge of the world he is attracted to, yet he is forced by attraction to concern himself with the world that repels him. – Italo Calvino
The alluring influences of bibliophilism, or book-loving, have silently crept into thousands of homes, whether beautiful or humble; for the library is properly regarded as one of the most important features of home as well as mental equipment. – Henry H. Harper, Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs, 1904
It seems to me that there must be an ecological limit to the number of paper pushers the earth can sustain, and that human civilization will collapse when the number of, say, tax lawyers exceeds the worlds total population of farmers, weavers, fisherpersons, and pediatric nurses. – Barbara Ehrenreich