Books were only one type of receptacle where we stored a lot of things we were afraid we might forget. There is nothing magical in them, at all. The … - Ray Bradbury

The wind outside nested in each tree, prowled the sidewalks in invisible treads like unseen cats.
Tom Skelton shivered. Anyone could see that the wind was a special wind this night, and the darkness took on a special feel because it was All Hallows' Eve. Everything seemed cut from soft black velvet or gold or orange velvet. Smoke panted up out of a thousand chimneys like the plumes of funeral parades. From kitchen windows drifted two pumpkin smells: gourds being cut, pies being baked.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.

Some laugh, some cry, some bang the world with fists, some run, but it all sums up the same: they make do.
The world swarms with people, each one drowning, but each swimming a different stroke to the far shore.