The Ultimate Book

"We were beside ourselves. My head reeled, as if I'd had too much to drink. I took the novels out of the suitcase one by one, opened them, studied the portraits of the authors, and passed them to Luo. Brushing them with the tips of my fingers made me feel as if my pale hands were in touch with human lives."

"I was carried away, swept along by the mighty stream of words pouring from the hundreds of pages. To me it was the ultimate book: once you had read it, neither your own life nor the world you lived in would ever look the same."

The narrator seems to feel as if he is not as "human" as the characters in the books. These forbidden objects are much more than simply words on a page to him; they are lives, better lives than his and Luo's. He touches the books with just "the tips of [his] fingers" because he doesn't want to ruin such a good thing. His life is anything but the dramatic, meaningful lives of the characters in the books. The narrator's life pales in comparison. Every detail is important to him: everything from the actual words and stories to the "portraits of the authors." He explored the books, not just looked over them; the same as when he and Luo read. They took in each and every word, every piece of the every new life they read about. Reading these banned books was not only a way for them to rebel and escape from their strict lives, but to dream about other people's lives.