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

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.

. . . what happened, of course, was that I was writing a play set in the 1940's that was supposed to be somehow representative of black American life, and I didn't have any women in there. And I knew that wasn't going to work.

Between speeches and awards, you can find something to do every other week. It's hard to write. Your focus gets splintered. Once you put one thing in your calendar, that month is gone.

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

All you need in the world is love and laughter. That's all anybody needs. To have love in one hand and laughter in the other.

You are responsible for the world that you live in.