The number one person who needs my books is me. I'm not some sort of disinterested guru who has worked life out and is handing things out to the poor people who might not have life worked out.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
There are people out there who will not read books, but somehow they'll read my books.
My books are very few, but then the world is before me - a library open to all - from which poverty of purse cannot exclude me - in which the meanest and most paltry volume is sure to furnish something to amuse, if not to instruct and improve.
If only one in 1,000 people that I talk to goes on to write a good book, that's one more good book that I've helped along... and maybe it will be a book I love myself five or 10 years down the line.
Everyone has a book within them. Everyone has to write it thinking, 'How will I help other people? What will the book do to touch lives?'
My books are about ordinary people, like you, me, people on the street, people who really have an expectation of reasonable happiness in life, want their life to have a sense of security and predictability, who want to belong to something bigger than them, who want love and affection in their life, who want a good future for the children.
I've got more ideas for books than I'll ever be able to use in my lifetime. I'm very fortunate like that.
It's neither my job nor within my capabilities to save people. But a book sure can try.
I know that the last thing a book wants is to just sit around unread, serving as an element of interior decorating. So when I have people over, all they have to do is glance at my books, and I implore them to take a few home with them. If I am really ambitious, I pack books into boxes and donate them to prisons.
Books are good enough in their own way, but they are a poor substitute for life.
I can't persuade myself that one of the problems facing the planet today might be a shortage of books by me.
No opposing quotes found.