Holding a precious book meant to Mendel what an assignment with a woman might to another man. These moments were his platonic nights of love. Books had power over him; money never did. Great collectors, including the founder of a collection in Princeton University Library, tried in vain to recruit him as an adviser and buyer for their librariesРJakob Mendel declined; no one could imagine him anywhere but in the Caf̩ Gluck. Thirty-three years ago, when his beard was still soft and black and he had ringlets over his forehead, he had come from the east to Vienna, a crook-backed lad, to study for the rabbinate, but he had soon abandoned Jehovah the harsh One God to give himself up to idolatry in the form of the brilliant, thousand-fold polytheism of books. That was when he had first found his way to the Caf̩ Gluck, and gradually it became his workplace, his headquarters, his post office, his world. Like an astronomer alone in his observatory, studying myriads of stars every night through the tiny round lens of the telescope, observing their mysterious courses, their wandering multitude as they are extinguished and then appear again, so Jakob Mendel looked through his glasses out from that rectangular table into the other universe of books, also eternally circling and being reborn in that world above our own. .Stefan Zweig
About This Quote
Jakob Mendel was a notable collector of books. His collection is still used today at the library. He cared more about the stories contained in the books than he did about the money. He was known as one of the most avid readers in Vienna at that time.
He was also known for his love of books and for using them to escape reality. One day, he met Georg Ehrenfried who offered him an assignment that would allow him to spend his time reading and taking notes on the books inside. The idea behind this assignment was to help Mendel with his duties as a teacher, but it ended up making his life more enjoyable and helped him find new ways to escape reality.
Some Similar Quotes
- I'm selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can't handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best.
- You've gotta dance like there's nobody watching, Love like you'll never be hurt, Sing like there's nobody listening, And live like it's heaven on earth.
- You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.
- A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you.
- Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
More Quotes By Stefan Zweig
- The strength of a love is always misjudged if we evaluate it by its immediate cause and not the stress that went before it, the dark and hollow space full of disappointment and loneliness that precedes all the great events in the heart's history.
- Only the person who has experienced light and darkness, war and peace, rise and fall, only that person has truly experienced life.
- Holding a precious book meant to Mendel what an assignment with a woman might to another man. These moments were his platonic nights of love. Books had power over him; money never did. Great collectors, including the founder of a collection in Princeton University Library,...
- Consciously or unconsciously, our education renders us slaves to morals, religion and a perceived vision of the world; our breath is the air of the epoch in which we live.
- But you smiled at me and said consolingly, "People come back again."" Yes" I said, "they come back, but then they have forgotten". There must have been something odd, something passionate in the way I said that to you. For you rose to your feet...