Without love for my fellow man and respect for nature, to me, life is an obscenity.

Question everything. Every stripe, every star, every word spoken. Everything.

I have learned as much about writing about my people by listening to blues and jazz and spirituals as I have by reading novels.

We all have much more in common than we have difference. I would say that about people all over the world. They don't know how much in common that they have

Don't tell me to believe. Don't tell me to believe in the same God or laws that men believe in who commit these murders. Don't tell me to believe that God can bless this country and that men are judged by their peers. Who among his peers judged him? Was I there? Was the minister there? Was Harry Williams there? Was Farrell Jarreau? Was my aunt? Was Vivian? No, his peers did not judge him, and I will not believe.

I suppose I started writing seriously at 16 years old. I thought I wrote a novel at 16 and sent it to New York! They sent it back because it wasn't novel.

Anytime a child is born, the old people look in his face and ask him if he's the One.