“I could read the great books but the great books don't interest me.”
Source: The Last Night of the Earth Poems
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Charles Bukowski555
American writer 1920–1994Related quotes
Robert Maynard Hutchins (1899–1977) philosopher and university president
Great Books: The Foundation of a Liberal Education (1954)
Mortimer J. Adler (1902–2001) American philosopher and educator
Source: How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading
Clive James (1939–2019) Australian author, critic, broadcaster, poet, translator and memoirist
'Borgias on my mind'
Essays and reviews, Glued to the Box (1983)
“No; that doesn't interest me.'
'That's because you never read a book about it.”
Ernest Hemingway book The Sun Also Rises
Source: The Sun Also Rises
“I don't know, maybe you'd be more interested in me if I were a book.”
Joe Hill (1879–1915) Swedish-American labor activist, songwriter, and member of the Industrial Workers of the World
Source: NOS4A2
“We shouldn't teach great books; we should teach a love of reading.”
B.F. Skinner (1904–1990) American behaviorist
As quoted in B. F. Skinner : The Man and His Ideas (1968) by Richard Isadore Evans, p. 73.
Context: We shouldn't teach great books; we should teach a love of reading. Knowing the contents of a few works of literature is a trivial achievement. Being inclined to go on reading is a great achievement.
