Married couples who quarrel bitterly every day may really need each other as deeply as those who appear to be desperately in love.
Edward AbbeyRead
There are only two kinds of books -- good books and the others. The good are winnowed from the bad through the democracy of time.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The value of books is determined over time, distinguishing between truly good books and lesser works.
Edward Abbey's quote suggests that there are fundamentally two types of books: good books that stand the test of time and lesser works that fade away. The 'democracy of time' implies that readers and society will eventually judge the quality of literature, separating valuable ideas from those that do not resonate or contribute meaningfully to our culture, emphasizing the importance of enduring wisdom and insights in literature.
Themes
BooksReadingLiteratureQualityTime
In practice
Example use cases
In a book club discussion, this quote can emphasize the importance of selecting quality literature.
More from Edward Abbey
All quotes →I love America because it is a confused, chaotic mess - and I hope we can keep it this way for at least another thousand years. The permissive society is the free society.
Edward AbbeyRead
If it's knowledge and wisdom you want, then seek out the company of those who do real work for an honest purpose.
Edward AbbeyRead
The earth is real. Only a fool, milking his cow, denies the cow's reality.
Edward AbbeyRead
I believe in nothing that I cannot touch, kiss, embrace.... The rest is only hearsay.
Edward AbbeyRead
Why can't we simply borrow what is useful to us from Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, especially Zen, as we borrow from Christianity, science, American Indian traditions and world literature in general, including philosophy, and let the rest go hang? Borrow what we need but rely principally upon our own senses, common sense and daily living experience.
Edward AbbeyRead
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On the whole, books are indeed less finite than ourselves. Even the worst among them outlast their authors - mainly because they occupy a smaller amount of physical space than those who penned them. Often they sit on the shelves absorbing dust long after the writer himself has turned into a handful of dust.
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Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill. Without books, the development of civilization would have been impossible. They are engines of change (as the poet said), windows on the world and lighthouses erected in the sea of time. They are companions, teachers, magicians, bankers of the treasures of the mind. Books are humanity in print.
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Every day in school, we said the pledge to the flag, 'with liberty and justice for all,' and I believed all that.
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