The misfortunes hardest to bear are these which never came.

Poetry comes with anger, hunger and dismay; it does not often visit groups of citizens sitting down to be literary together, and would appal them if it did.

Why do they put the Gideon Bibles only in the bedrooms, where it's usually too late...?

There is no mistaking a real book when one meets it. It is like falling in love, and like that colossal adventure it is an experience of great social import. Even as the tranced swain, the booklover yearns to tell others of his bliss. He writes letters about it, adds it to the postscript of all manner of communications, intrudes it into telephone messages, and insists on his friends writing down the title of the find. Like the simple-hearted betrothed, once certain of his conquest

The everlasting lure of round-the-corner, how fascinating it is.

Living in a bookshop is like living in a warehouse of explosives. Those shelves are ranked with the most furious combustibles in the world--the brains of men.

The little Plumpuppets are fairies of beds; They have nothing to do but watch sleepyheads; They turn down the sheets and they tuck you in tight, And dance on your pillow to wish you good night!