Anne Fadiman Quotes

A library represents the mind of its collector, fancies and foibles, strengths and weaknesses, prejudices and preferences.

Your library is your portrait.

My only saving grace is that I actually collect things that nobody else is interested in.

I do like having books on my shelves. I do value that life.

You won't understand me unless you understand that I am an odd ball.

I wasn't necessarily always funny, I don't know if I necessarily am - some would argue not - but I was definitely, always been a strange one. Definitely always an odd duck.

The weirder the better for me.

I've always been weird, and into weird stuff that has a hard time finding mainstream success.

I feel like the most human among us are the weirdest among us. Those voices can be the most creative and the most special. You look around at your parents, your friends, your aunts and uncles, and you realize nobody is normal.

The man who has a library of his own collection is able to contemplate himself objectively, and is justified in believing in his own existence.

All tastes are expressions of belief.

A lot of my peer group think I'm an eccentric bisexual, like I may even have an ammonia-filled tentacle somewhere on my body. That's okay.

Maybe it's just in America, but it seems that if you're passionate about something, it freaks people out. You're considered bizarre or eccentric. To me, it just means you know who you are.

At the end of it all, it's my little movie library, and you see aspects of me through that.

When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. People know themselves much better than you do. That's why it's important to stop expecting them to be something other than who they are

I like weird. I like weird a lot.

What we read and why we do so defines us in a profound way. You are what you read, I suppose. Browsing through someone’s library is like peeking into their DNA.

Me and normal have never really been on speaking terms.

... the subjective viewpoint is the only one to use regarding a library. Your true library is a collection of the books you want.You may have deplorably poor taste or bad judgment. Never mind. Correct those traits before you exchange your books.

There's something in everyone only they know.

Against the background of general freakishness the case of my particular freakishness was lost.

Even beauty cannot always palliate eccentricity.

Seeing one's books on the shelf tells you so much about the way somebody has, over the years, put together their private library, which is a reflection of their minds and their selves.

ECCENTRICITY, n. A method of distinction so cheap that fools employ it to accentuate their incapacity.

The writer is committed when he plunges to the very depths of himself with the intent to disclose, not his individuality, but his person in the complex society that conditions and supports him.