All you need is the blues. To me, the blues is the book, it's the bible, it's everything.

What comes forth from you as an artist cannot be controlled. But you have responsibilities as a global citizen. Your history dictates your duty. And by writing about black people, you are not limiting yourself. The experiences of African-Americans are as wide open as God's closet.

You are responsible for the world that you live in.

Style ain't nothing but keeping the same idea from beginning to end. Everybody got it.

My greatest influence has been the blues. And that's a literary influence, because I think the blues is the best literature that we as black Americans have.

The blues are important primarily because they contain the cultural expression and the cultural response to blacks in America and to the situation that they find themselves in. And contained in the blues is a philosophical system at work. And as part of the oral tradition, this is a way of passing along information.

I think that's the core of black aesthetics: the ability to improvise. That is what has enabled our [black people's] survival.