To read is to withdraw. To make oneself unavailable. One would feel easier about it if the pursuit inself were less...selfish.

Alan Bennett
About This Quote

To read is to withdraw.To make oneself unavailable. One would feel easier about it if the pursuit inself were less...selfish. First of all, it is not selfish to read. It is selfish to be caught up in materialistic pursuits like buying things and spending money on things that don’t matter (that will only keep you from reading).

This quote is about how reading can be selfish, because reading makes you unavailable. You might be saying, “If I read, I am no longer available to my family and friends!” However, this is not true. Reading makes you available to your friends and family, but maybe not for the reasons you think it does.

Reading makes you available to them because it helps you become a better person. It helps you become more informed so that you can help yourself or others when they need it. When people need help, the smart thing to do is come prepared so that they don’t have to wait around for months or years just to get the help they need.

The first step toward helping others is helping yourself first.

Source: The Uncommon Reader

Some Similar Quotes
  1. Time was passing like a hand waving from a train I wanted to be on. I hope you never have to think about anything as much as I think about you. - Jonathan Safran Foer

  2. Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away.. and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast.. be happy about your growth, in... - Rainer Maria Rilke

  3. But many of us seek community solely to escape the fear of being alone. Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape. - Bell Hooks

  4. Closed in a room, my imagination becomes the universe, and the rest of the world is missing out. - Criss Jami

  5. I suffer from life and from other people. I can’t look at reality face to face. Even the sun discourages and depresses me. Only at night and all alone, withdrawn, forgotten and lost, with no connection to anything real or useful – only then do... - Fernando Pessoa

More Quotes By Alan Bennett
  1. You don't put your life into your books, you find it there.

  2. We started off trying to set up a small anarchist community, but people wouldn't obey the rules.

  3. One recipe for happiness is to have to sense of entitlement.' To this she added a star and noted at the bottom of the page: 'This is not a lesson I have ever been in a position to learn.

  4. I'm not "happy" but I'm not unhappy about it.

  5. Too late. It was all too late. But she went on, determined as ever and always trying to catch up.

Related Topics