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The books of power, as distinguished from the books of knowledge, include the original, creative, first-hand books in all literatures, and constitute, in the last analysis, a comparatively small group, with which any student can thoroughly familiarise himself.
The literary impulse of the race has expressed itself in a great variety of works, of varying charm and power; but the books which are fountain-heads of vitality, ideas, and beauty, are few in number. These original and dominant…
Carlyle says that a collection of books is a true university in these days. It might be added that often the smaller the collection the larger shall be the university.
Education derived from libraries is unsafe, for book-dissipation, as well as drunkenness, ends in debauchery. Toward the end of his long and wide-awake life Doctor Holmes advised a young correspondent to confine his reading to the Bible, Shakespeare, and a good dictionary. The list of men who have been lifted to higher regions…
One of the greatest monopolies in history was the medieval Catholic Church. Its religious and temporal power was absolute until confronted by an even more potent rival: the printed book. Today, print is once more at the centre of a cultural revolution. Only this time it is not the challenger to a global monopoly but its most successful weapon.
Amazon, founded and controlled by Jeff Bezos, used the humble book to leverage itself into becoming the world’s largest online retailer. It took…
No publisher in 2016 can ignore the shark in the waters; Amazon, a hungry behemoth encroaching on publishers’ margins, and staking its claim to much of the emerging market of books as digital products. Amazon has unrivalled access to our hearts and minds; exploiting the existing infrastructure in the UK of the postal service, health services and its workforce without making any contribution to its upkeep, it steamrollers over traditional publishing models with an irresistible blanket service.…