Reading Day

Let's be reasonable and add an eighth day to the week

that is devoted exclusively to reading. 

I've seen this quote attributed to Lena Dunham, but I don't have a source for that. The picture shows the Science Library of Upper Lusatia in Görlitz, Germany.

READING IS FUN: IMAGINATION CELEBRATION

Some BEAUTIFUL posters by Maurice Sendak about the joys of reading, from Maria Popova's Brain Pickings:

IMAGINATION CELEBRATION

READING IS FUN

Reading is Dangerous

Grant Snider is an ingenious artist, and he has created many posters inspired by reading and writing. I really like this poster about the dangers of reading, especially the part about proofreading of course, ha ha. For the full-size view, see Grant Snider's blog: Reading Is Dangerous. His work is also available in poster-size to put on your wall.

Escape from Reality... Into New Worlds

Two beautiful graphics from Caro Martini:

Escape from Reality... 

Into New Worlds

There's no such thing as too many books.

This is a wonderful graphic from Last Lemon, which is the work of Lisa Swerling & Ralph Lazar:

There's no such thing as too many books.

The Last Lemon: On reading

Some lovely graphics from HaroldsPlanet.com: The Last Lemon.

Books are better.

Sleep is good, and books are better. The words are spoken by Tyrion Lannister, a character in George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones.

Reading Glasses

Wouldn't it be great if all we had to do was hand out glasses to people in order for them to learn how to read?

It reminds me of Joseph Smith and the "seer stones" (Urim & Thummim) he used in reading the Golden Plates; you can read more about that at Wikipedia.

Reading Glasses: Do you mean to tell me we spent all that time learning words when we could have just been wearing these magic spectacles?



Cartoon by Dave Coverly

When in doubt, go to the library!

Of course I really like this graphic:

When in doubt, go to the library!

What Kind of Reader Are You?

I thought this was a funny infographic: I'm an altruistic polygamist! :-)

This is a Library

I found this delightful item at Google+.

This is a LIBRARY: crossroads of civilization, refuge of all the arts against the ravages of time, armory of fearless truth against whispering rumor and incessant trumpet of trade; from this place words may fly abroad, not to perish as digital waves but fixed in time, not corrupted by the hurrying hand but verified in proof. Friend, you stand on sacred ground: this is a  LIBRARY.

A Thousand Lives

This is a wonderful quote about reading from George RR Martin:

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies.

The man who never reads lives only one.

Image by KOMU News at Flickr.

What Happens When You Read

Hector Bassi shared this image at Google+ but I cannot read the name of the original artist; if anyone recognizes this artist, please let me know!

The Time-Pressed Online Reader

You've probably seen the Internet abbreviation TL;DR ... well, here are some variations on TL;DR by the genius cartoonist Tom Gauld:

Everything I Need to Know, I Learned from a Book

This great graphic comes from @IntrovertDoodle: it uses the metaphor of reading books to illustrate happiness in real life!

Everything I Need to Know, I Learned from a Book
Things usually turn out okay in the end. If not... there's probably a sequel.
It's bood to be different. Be weird. Be complex. Be anything but trite.
All the best characters are flawed. You are NOT a failure.
When things go wrong, hang in there. It's just a plot twist.

My Bookshelf

Grant Snider is one of my favorite cartoonists, and I like this whimsical inventory of his bookshelf; full-sized view at Grant Snider's website.

The book I couldn't put down

The book I couldn't pick up

The book you gave me (I haven't read it yet - sorry!)

The book I brought to the beach

The book I tried so hard to like

The book I somehow own three copies of

The book that saved my life

The book I lent you (can I have it back?)

The book I fall asleep to every night

The book I mistook for a hat

The book I'm desperately trying to write

All the books that changed my life

Yoga for Book Lovers

You can find out more at Quirk Books.

1 Squatting Librarian

2 Standing Bookbend

3 Oxford Comma

4 Downward Pageview

5 Middle Shelf

6 Tangled Plot

7 Standing Footnote

8 Standing Blurb

9 Table of Contents

10 Dangling Participle

11 Final Chapter

12 Sleeping Editor

Reading is Magic

The words come from the astronomer Carl Sagan, who was also a great writer; here is an extended quote as reported in BrainPickings:

What an astonishing thing a book is. It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.

(the image is from Pixabay)

The Loudest Sounds

I often wish for exactly the day described here in Aaron Caycedo-Kimura's graphic:

Let us read, and let us dance

Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. — Voltaire, in "Liberty of the Press," Dictionnaire philosophique (1785-1789)

Let us read, and let us dance;

these two amusements

will never do any harm to the world.