The library is inhabited by spirits that come out of the pages at night.

Allende’s image treats books as living presences: once a library is filled with stories, it becomes “inhabited” by the voices, memories, and imagined worlds stored in print. The “spirits” suggest both the afterlife of authors and characters—who continue to act on readers long after the writing is finished—and the uncanny intimacy of reading, especially at night when silence heightens imagination. The line also implies that libraries are not inert repositories but active, almost sacred spaces where the past can reanimate itself. In this sense, the quote celebrates literature’s power to conjure companionship, haunt us with ideas, and make private rooms feel populated by invisible company.