One Thousand and One Nights

"Wholl change old lamps for new ones?"

"On the black road of life think not to find Either a friend or lover to your mind; If you must love, oh then, love solitude, For solitude alone is true and kind."

"Scheherazade...possessed courage, wit, and penetration, infinitely above her sex. She had read much, and had so admirable a memory, that she never forgot any thing she had read. She had successfully applied herself to philosophy, medicine, history, and the liberal arts; and her poetry excelled the compositions of the best writers of her time. Besides this, she was a perfect beauty, and all her accomplishments were crowned by solid virtue."

"I discovered fantasy and eroticism in One Thousand and One Nights, which I read in Lebanon at age fourteen. At that time and in that place, girls didnt have much social life aside from school and family; we didnt even go to the movies. My only escape from a troublesome family life was reading. My stepfather had four mysterious leather volumes in his locked closet, forbidden books that I was not supposed to see because they were “erotic.” Of course I found a way to copy the key and get in the closet when he was not around. I used a flashlight, could not mark the pages, and read quickly, skipping pages and looking for the dirty parts. My hormones were raging and my imagination went wild with those fantastic tales. When critics call me a Latin America Sheherazade I feel very flattered!"

"The proverb says: "Each man envies, the strong openly, the weak in secret."

"A library of books is the fairest garden in the world, and to walk there is an ecstasy."