I look at my books the way parents look at their children. The fact that one becomes more successful than the others doesn't make me love the less successful one any less.

Tying the little folks with the older folks is a great and powerful tool to preserve and to protect the family and the individual.

I don't know anywhere in the world where there is not racism against somebody.

Nobody can do for little children what grandparents do. Grandparents sort of sprinkle stardust over the lives of little children.

It's always intrigued me that amidst the group called slaves there were individuals who were extremely able, who were extremely colorful, who were powerful personalities, who by no means fit the usual images of slaves. They were people who, through their personalities and abilities, were very respected in the community where they lived by both black and white.

In all of us there is a hunger, marrow-deep, to know our heritage- to know who we are and where we have come from. Without this enriching knowledge, there is a hollow yearning. No matter what our attainments in life, there is still a vacuum, an emptiness, and the most disquieting loneliness.

Most of us prefer to be as quiet as possible about giving, because every time it's publicized that we do something, if it's something of the nature of giving, we'll be doubly besieged, and you really get sick of being always criticized no matter what you do.