“That book is good in vain, which the reader throws away.”
The Life of Dryden
Lives of the English Poets (1779–81)
Context: It is not by comparing line with line, that the merit of great works is to be estimated, but by their general effects and ultimate result. It is easy to note a weak line, and write one more vigorous in its place; to find a happiness of expression in the original, and transplant it by force into the version: but what is given to the parts may be subducted from the whole, and the reader may be weary, though the critick may commend. Works of imagination excel by their allurement and delight; by their power of attracting and detaining the attention. That book is good in vain, which the reader throws away. He only is the master, who keeps the mind in pleasing captivity; whose pages are perused with eagerness, and in hope of new pleasure are perused again; and whose conclusion is perceived with an eye of sorrow, such as the traveller casts upon departing day.
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Samuel Johnson 362
English writer 1709–1784Related quotes
“Be you writer or reader, it is very pleasant to run away in a book.”
Source: My Side of the Mountain
Success
1870s, Society and Solitude (1870)
“Why tear off a single page when you can throw away the book?”
Torches Together.
Catch For Us The Foxes (2004)
“Good books make you ask questions. Bad readers want everything answered.”
“The reader collaborates with the author in every book, or The reader is co-author in every book.”
Tout livre a pour collaborateur son lecteur
Source: Biographical notice http://www.evene.fr/celebre/biographie/maurice-barres-499.php on Evene
“The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas, and throw the bad ones away.”
Variant: The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.