“I collect new books the way my girlfriends buy designer handbags.”

“I collect new books the way my friends collect designer handbags. Sometimes, I just like to know I have them and actually reading them is beside the point. Not that I don't eventually end up reading them. I do. But the mere act of buying them makes me happy.”

“When I buy a new book, I always read the last page first, that way in case I die before I finish, I know how it ends. That, my friend, is a dark side.”

“Wear the old coat and buy the new book.”

“Professors of literature collect books the way a ship collects barnacles, without seeming effort.”

“Sometimes, looking at the many books I have at home, I feel I shall die before I come to the end of them, yet I cannot resist the temptation of buying new books. Whenever I walk into a bookstore and find a book on one of my hobbies — for example, Old English or Old Norse poetry — I say to myself, “What a pity I can’t buy that book, for I already have a copy at home.”