Why are we reading, if not in hope of beauty laid bare, life heightened and its deepest mystery probed? Can the writer isolate and vivify all in experience that most deeply engages our intellects and our heats? Can the writer renew our hope for literary forms? Why are we reading if not in hope that the writer will magnify and dramatize our days, will illuminate and inspire us with wisdom, courage, and the possibility of meaningfulness, and will press upon our minds the deepest mysteries, so we may feel again their majesty and power? . Annie Dillard
About This Quote

When we read for the first time, we are often overwhelmed by the beauty of words and images. The first time we read a book, our mind is not yet exhausted by the over-abundance of information that has flooded our world. We are still young and underemployed, standing at the entrance to life looking back on it with wonder and awe. The first time we read a book, the writer has not yet exhausted us with information.

We are still young and underemployed, standing at the entrance to life looking back on it with wonder and awe. As time passes, people grow up and become adults. They begin to develop their own unique personalities through experiences that they have gone through.

These experiences cause them to mature into individuals who can handle information at an increased rate. With this increased rate of maturity, the writer’s job becomes harder as their audience grows older and more knowledgeable than they are. As time passes, people grow up and become adults.

They begin to develop their own unique personalities through experiences that they have gone through. These experiences cause them to mature into individuals who can handle information at an increased rate. With this increased rate of maturity, the writer’s job becomes harder as their audience grows older and more knowledgeable than they are.

Source: The Writing Life

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More Quotes By Annie Dillard
  1. How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.
  2. Spend the afternoon, you can't take it with you.
  3. You do not have to sit outside in the dark. If, however, you want to look at the stars, you will find that darkness is necessary. But the stars neither require nor demand it.
  4. Could two live that way? Could two live under the wild rose, and explore by the pond, so that the smooth mind of each is as everywhere present to the other, and as received and as unchallenged, as falling snow?
  5. Eskimo: "If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?" Priest: "No, not if you did not know." Eskimo: "Then why did you tell me?
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