Each reader is but one chapter in the life of a book, and unless he passes his knowledge onto others, it is as if he condemned the book to be buried alive.

I love this. Readers have a responsibility to the text that extends beyond merely reading it; and a book fights for air unless its readers fight to save it.

The Library that wanted to be the storehouse for the memory of the world was not able to secure for us the memory of itself. All we know of it, all that remains of its vastness, its marbles and its scrolls, are its various raisons d’être.

Speaking, of course, on the Library of Alexandria. How many libraries have we lost already? How many more will we lose? Perhaps I should know better, but I have more confidence in the lifespans of the books on my shelves than I do of anything in Google’s vast repository.