Suffice it to say, I'm not poor.

You got to take the crookeds with the straights. That's what Papa used to say.

The details of our struggle to survive and prosper, in what has been a difficult and sometimes bitter relationship with a system of laws and practices that deny us access to the tools necessary for productive and industrious life, are available to any serious student of history or sociology.

You got to be right with yourself before you can be right with anybody else.

All of art is a search for ways of being, of living life more fully.

For me, the original play becomes an historical document: This is where I was when I wrote it, and I have to move on now to something else.

I am not a historian. I happen to think that the content of my mother's life - her myths, her superstitions, her prayers, the contents of her pantry, the smell of her kitchen, the song that escaped from her sometimes parched lips, her thoughtful repose and pregnant laughter - are all worthy of art.