Books

Fun Book Facts!

• The three most read books in the world are: The Holy Bible, Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-Tung, and Harry Potter.

• Abibliophobia is the fear of running out of reading material.

• The first novel written on a typewriter is said to be Mark Twain's The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer.

• People in Iceland read more books per capita than any other country in the world.

• The largest bound book in the world is The Klencke Atlas. A 1.75 meter tall by 1.9 meter wide tome that is so heavy six people are necessary to lift it. It was presented as a gift to Charles II of England by Johannes Klencke in 1660.

• Bibliosmia is the enjoyment of the smell of old books.

• The Harry Potter books are allegedly the most banned books in America due to religious complaints.

• J.M. Barrie gave the rights of Peter Pan to the Children’s Hospital on Great Ormond Street, London so they could always collect royalties and fund the hospital.

• The first book ever published was the Gutenberg Bible in 1453. It was printed by the inventor of the printing press himself, Johannes Gutenberg. The Gutenberg Bible and the Gutenberg press are considered revolutionary, and to have ushered in a new era in human history.

• The Japanese word tsundoku means ‘buying a load of books and then not getting round to reading them’.

• In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust is the longest novel which exists. The book made its mark in Guinness Book of World Records and could quite easily double up as a mightily effective doorstop with 13 volumes clocking up nearly 1.3 million words.

• The earliest known work of literature is an epic poem titled the Epic of Gilgamesh, from Ancient Mesopotamia. Because paper books did not exist at the time, the whole tale is told on 12 tablets.

• One of the largest libraries of the ancient world was considered to be the Ancient Library of Alexandria, in Alexandria, Egypt. Any books that came into the city’s port became library property, and a copy was created for the owner. It is estimated to have housed up to 400,000 scrolls of text, before it was destroyed. The destruction of the Library of Alexandria is famed and romanticized as one of the greatest historical cultural losses to mankind.

• The current largest library in the world is the United States Library of Congress, which houses more than 38 million books.

Famous Quotes About Books

“A room without books is like a body without a soul.” – Marcus Tullius Cicero

“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.” – Jorge Luis Borges

“There is no friend as loyal as a book.” – Ernest Hemingway

"We lose ourselves in books. We find ourselves there too." – Anonymous

"Books are a uniquely portable magic." – Stephen King

"Reading gives us someplace to go when we have to stay where we are." - Mason Cooley

"There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all." – Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

"You can’t buy happiness, but you can buy books and that’s kind of the same thing." – Anonymous

"There are perhaps no days of our childhood we lived so fully as those we spent with a favorite book." – Marcel Proust

"The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go." – Dr. Seuss

"We read to know that we are not alone." – William Nicholson

"A book is a device to ignite the imagination." – Alan Bennett

“That’s the thing about books. They let you travel without moving your feet.” - Jhumpa Lahiri

“No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting.” – Lady M. W. Montagu

"Books have to be heavy because the whole world is inside them." - Cornelia Funke

"Read a book and you are giving yourself an inner life. Reading is a rendezvous with your soul." - Jeanette Winterson

"Great books help you understand, and they help you feel understood." – John Green

"There are no faster or firmer friendships than those formed between people who love the same books." - Irving Stone

"The library is the temple of learning and learning has liberated more people than all the wars in history. "– Carl T. Rowan

"Books are open doors to other dimensions where everything is possible and nothing is forbidden. "- Danny Tyran

"Words are alive and literature becomes an escape, not from, but into living." - Cyril Connolly