We Don't Simply Read Books. We Become

Ruefulness Is One Of The Classical Tones Of American Fiction. It Fosters A Native, Deglamorized Form Of Anxiety.

Travel Is Like Adultery: One Is Always Tempted To Be Unfaithful To One's Own Country. To Have Imagination Is Inevitably To Be Dissatisfied With Where You Live. There Is In Men, As Peter Quennell Said, "a Centrifugal Tendency." In Our Wanderlust, We Are Lovers Looking For Consummation.

Sometimes It Seems That We Might Have Been Happier If We Had Once Had An Aristocracy To Blame Everything On.

The More I Like A Book, The More Reluctant I Am To Turn The Page. Lovers, Even Book Lovers, Tend To Cling. No One-night Stands Or "reads" For Them.

The Contents Of Someone's Bookcase Are Part Of His History, Like An Ancestral Portrait.