What frustrates me is to see African-Americans behave as though what European-Americans say is worthwhile. It simply isn't. It's just some silly people who can make laws and have the power to enforce them. I'm often amazed at the conversations black people have about themselves. They ought to be having these conversations about white people. It's white people who are flawed and at fault.

Once you cease to be a master, once you throw off your master's yoke, you are no longer human rubbish, you are a human being, and all the things that adds up to. So, too, with the slaves. Once they are no longer slaves, once they are free, they are no longer noble and exalted; they are just human beings.

It is sad that unless you are born a god, your life,from its very beginning, is a mystery to you.

It was hollow, my triumph, I could feel that, but I held on to it just the same.

I am not aware of anything below my neck. I live completely in my head.

I was a new person then, I knew things I had not known before, I knew things that you can know only if you have been through what I had just been through.

The shadow of my mother danced around the room to a tune that my own shadow sang.