WHY READ?

"It matters, if individiuals are to retain any capacity to form their own judgements and opinions, that they continue to read for themselves. How they read, well or badly, and what they read, cannot depend wholly on themselves, but why they read must be for and in their own interest. You can read merely to pass the time, or you can read with an overt urgency, but evetually you will read against the clock. Bible readers, those who search the Bible for themslves, perhaps exemplify the urgency more plainly than readers of Shakespeare, yet the quest is the same. One of the uses of reading is to prepare ourselves for change, and the final change alas is unversal."

From How To Read And Why by Harold Bloom. I’ve been re-reading this great book and probably could select a quote from every page to post.