We have compiled a list of great quotes about reading by famous authors, poets, presidents, scientists, artists, visionaries and even actors.
“It is not enough to simply teach children to read; we have to give them something worth reading. Something that will stretch their imaginations – – something that will help them make sense of their own lives and encourage them to reach out toward people whose lives are quite different from their own.”
—Katherine Patterson
“There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all.”
—Jacqueline Kennedy
“I will defend the importance of bedtime stories to my last gasp.”
—JK Rowling
“I have a passion for teaching kids to become readers, to become comfortable with a book, not daunted. Books shouldn’t be daunting, they should be funny, exciting and wonderful; and learning to be a reader gives a terrific advantage.”
—Roald Dahl
“From your parents you learn love and laughter and how to put one foot before the other. But when books are opened you discover you have wings.”
—Helen Hayes
“Reading is important. If you know how to read, then the whole world opens up to you.”
— Barack Obama
“Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading one of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.”
—Maya Angelou
“Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind.”
—James Russell Lowell
“Children are made readers on the laps of their parents.”
—Emilie Buchwald
“There is no such thing as a child who hates to read; there are only children who have not found the right book.”
— Frank Serafini
“A children’s story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children’s story in the slightest.”
—C.S. Lewis
“He that loves reading has everything within his reach.”
—William Godwin
“I do not read a book; I hold a conversation with the author.”
—Elbert Hubbard
“To learn to read is to light a fire; every syllable that is spelled is a spark.”
—Victor Hugo
“You cannot open a book without learning something.”
—Confucius
“You teach a child to read, and he or she will be able to pass a literacy test.”
—George W. Bush
“I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a good book.”
— J K Rowling
“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.”
— Frederick Douglass
“There are many little ways to enlarge your world. Love of books is the best of all.”
— Jacqueline Kennedy
“Reading without reflecting is like eating without digesting.”
—Edmund Burke
“Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body.”
—Richard Steele
“Books train your mind to imagination to think big.”
—Taylor Swift
“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.”
—Frederick Douglass
“A book is like a garden, carried in the pocket.”
—Chinese Proverb
“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”
—Dr. Seuss
“The only way to do all the things you’d like to do is to read.”
—Tom Clancy
