It had always been my habit-- privately I felt it to be an ecstasy-- to enter, as into a mysterious vault, any public library. I was drawn to books that had been read before, novels that girls like myself had cradled and cherished. In my mind-- I suppose in my isolation-- I seized on all those previous readers, and everyone who would read after me, as phantom companions and secret friends.
Cynthia Ozick, Heir to the Glimmering World
libraries