“There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches.”
“It’s not lit, it’s literature. Lit is something a book can be, after you’ve decided to burn it. (I suggest you start the fire with my book.)”
“If there is anything more annoying in the world than having people talk about you, it is certainly having no one talk about you.”
“I care more about the people in books than the people I see every day.”
“Coloured people don't like Little Black Sambo. Burn it. White people don't feel good about Uncle Tom's Cabin. Burn it. Someone's written a book on tobacco and cancer of the lungs? The cigarette people are weeping? Burn the book.”
“What people value in their books—and thus what they count as literature—really tells you more about them than it does about the book.”