Charles Lamb Quotes

Only those books come down which deserve to last . All the gilt edges, vellum and morocco, all the presentation copies to all the libraries will not preserve a book in circulation beyond its intrinsic date.

A novel must be exceptionally good to live as long as the average cat.

As part of my research for An Anthology of Authors' Atrocity Stories About Publishers, I conducted a study (employing my usual controls) that showed the average shelf life of a trade book to be somewhere between milk and yoghurt.

In my opinion, what makes a great book is something that is universally specific.

How do you tell a valuable French book?' 'First there are the pictures. Then it is a question of the quality of the pictures. Then it is the binding. If a book is good, the owner will have it bound properly. All books in English are bound, but bound badly. There is no way of judging them.

Great books write themselves, only bad books have to be written.

A classic is a book that remains in print

An award does not change the quality of a book.

The best book of the year, Grobel's writing is quite marvelous. The Hustons reads vividly, just like one of John Huston's great films.

If a book is really good, it deserves to be read again, and if it's great, it should be read at least three times.

A man can write one book that can be great, but this doesn't make him a great writer-just the writer of a great book. . . I think a writer has to extend very widely, as well as plunge very deep, to be a great novelist.

Vivian Abenshushan and Veronica Gerber write brilliant books that defy generic conventions.

I always think of books as being like people. Even the dull ones are worthy of decent respect, but you don't have to seek them out and spend time with them.

The smaller the ball used in the sport, the better the book.

The virtue of books is to be readable.

A bad book about the love of God remains a bad book.

For me, a good children's book is a good children's book is a good children's book.

There are only two kinds of books -- good books and the others. The good are winnowed from the bad through the democracy of time.

If a book really wants the patronage of a great name, it is a bad book; and if it be a good book, it wants it not.

When a book, any sort of book, reaches a certain intensity of artistic performance it becomes literature.

When a book, any sort of book, reaches a certain intensity of artistic performance, it becomes literature. That intensity may be a matter of style, situation, character, emotional tone, or idea, or half a dozen other things. It may also be a perfection of control over the movement of a story similar to the control a great pitcher has over the ball.

A book may be very amusing with numerous errors, or it may be very dull without a single absurdity.

It is true that the discerning intellect of the world is always much in advance of the creative, so that there are competent judges of the best book, and few writers of the best books.

It's really hard to get a book published, even a good book, but the better the book is the better chance it has of eventually catching someone's attention.

The highest praise a writer can give another is to say he wishes he had written his book. I wish I had written Forty Words for Sorrow. Giles Blunt has a tremendous talent. If you miss Forty Words for Sorrow, you'll miss one of best novels of 2001.