Book Review: The Official Walt Disney Quote Book

The Official Walt Disney Quote Book has been compiled by the Walt Disney Archives team and released as part of the Disney 100 celebration.  The book features hundreds of quotes from Walt on various subjects organized into 21 chapters spanning over 300 pages.

Each chapter starts off with a full page picture of Walt and then there are between one and three quotes on each subsequent page.  There is no narrative or supporting text throughout the chapters.  There are some additional photos scattered around.  In the appendix is a source section and a photo caption section.

Here are the chapters/topics:

1. On films and animation
2. On Mickey Mouse
3. On storytelling
4. On the Disney theme parks
5. On business and the Walt Disney Company
6. On success and failure
7. On money
8. On children, young and old
9. On family
10. On education
11. On America
12. On animals and nature
13. On art, music, and dance
14. On progress and innovation
15. On television
16. On enlightenment, exploration and experimentation
17. On life
18. On health and wellness
19. On love, kindness, and peace
20. On wonder
21. On gratitude and appreciation

I enjoyed reading the quotes. A majority of them I had seen, heard, or read in some form or another over the years but there were some that were new to me or I just did not remember.    I was a little frustrated reading the book though.  I had to keep flipping between the quote and the sources listing in the back of the book. I would have much preferred to have had the source information on the page with the quote, same with the image captions, having them near the image vs a reference in the back of the book.  Constantly flipping back and forth was a tad annoying to me.

This book builds upon the 1994 & 2001 quote books Dave Smith and the archives team put together then.  I do own nor do I recall reading either of these previous books so  I cannot offer a comparison or recommendation if you already own one.

Be sure to visit our 2023 Disney Book List for reviews and links to other releases from this year.

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** A review copy of this book was provided to us