After years in white theaters I dreaded working in colored houses. The noise, the stomping, whistling, and cheering that hadn't annoyed me when I was young was now something I dreaded.

The big compliment came from the beer drinkers who didn't know me. They wouldn't drink or move when I sang. If they had their glasses in mid-air, the glasses wouldn't come down.

I never posed as a saint. I would have slept with a man for nothing if I liked him well enough.

We show girls were forced to live in whorehouses in each town, no other accommodations being available.

We are all gifted. That is our inheritance.

I learned early in life not to judge others. We outcasts are very happy and content to leave that job to our social superiors.

Negroes are human beings with exactly the same faults and virtues as members of the other races.