Friday, September 7, 2007

A Cornucopia of Book Quotes

Yesterday my oldest daughter came home saying her English teacher didn't like for them to use the expression 'a lot' when speaking about plenty and they were supposed to come up with as many alternative words and phrases as possible.

She proceeded to name off many of the following words and I added a few as well: many, abundance, ample, copious, plenty, plenteous, plentiful, profusion, overflowing, bounty, plethora, bountiful, teeming and rich.*

Then she said that someone in her class suggested a strange "c" word no one had ever heard of.

"Oh! 'Cornucopia'!" I said triumphantly.

"Yes!" She looked at me in surprise, "How did you know that?" Why do our children think we were born yesterday?

A cornucopia, I proceeded to explain to her, is an overflowing horn of plenty--like what you see pictured in many Thanksgiving pictures.

And then, because life is stranger than fiction, I happened to notice that on the cover of one of my favorite book catalogs, Bas Bleu, I saw the picture of -- yes -- a cornucopia of Books! Now what could be nicer?

So I shall put that at the top of my post where I'll begin to collect my favorite book quotes!
Here are just a couple to begin with:

"That is a good book which is opened with expectation, and closed with delight and profit." ~~Bronson Alcott

"An elegant sufficiency, content, retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books." ~~James Thomson

"I have sought for happiness everywhere, but have found it nowhere except in a little corner with a little book." ~~Thomas à Kempis

"My book and heart must never part." ~~The New England Primer (oldest known copy extant is dated 1737)

"Classic." A book which people praise and don't read. ~~Mark Twain

"Knowing I lov'd my books, he furnish'd me, from mine own library with volumes that I prize above my dukedom." ~~Skakespeare: "The Tempest"

". . . be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue." ~~Rainer Maria Rilke

"The best books, he perceived, are those that tell you what you know already." ~~George Orwell, from 1984

"A good book is the best of friends, the same today and forever." ~~Martin Farquhar Tupper

* If you can think of more, please let us know!

No comments:

Post a Comment