I cried a river of tears but he was too heavy to float on them. So I dragged him with me these years across an ocean.

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

Death ain't nothing but a fastball on the outside corner.

Blues is the bedrock of everything I do. All the characters in my plays, their ideas and their attitudes, the stance that they adopt in the world, are all ideas and attitudes that are expressed in the blues.

My influences have been what I call my four Bs - the primary one being the blues, then Borges, Baraka, and Bearden.

I write for myself and my goal is bringing that world and that experience of black Americans to life on the stage and giving it a space there.

A novelist writes a novel, and people read it. But reading is a solitary act. While it may elicit a varied and personal response, the communal nature of the audience is like having five hundred people read your novel and respond to it at the same time. I find that thrilling.