There are so many ways of being despicable it quite makes oneโs head spin. But the way to be really despicable is to be contemptuous of other peopleโs pain.
James A. BaldwinI love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. I think all theories are suspect, that the finest principles may have to be modified, or may even be pulverized by the demands of life, and that one must find, therefore, one's own moral center and move through the world hoping that this center will guide one aright.
James A. BaldwinI started reading. I read everything I could get my hands on...By the time I was thirteen I had read myself out of Harlem. I had read every book in two libraries and had a card for the Forty-Second Street branch.
James A. BaldwinThe moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.
James A. BaldwinI don't know, now, when I first looked at Hella and found her stale, found her body uninteresting, her presence grating. It seemed to happen all at onceโI suppose that only means that it had been happening for a long time.
James A. BaldwinIt seems to me that one ought to rejoice in the fact of death-- ought to decide, indeed, to earn one's death by confronting with passion the conundrum of life. One is responsible to life: It is the small beacon in that terrifying darkness from which we come and to which we shall return. One must negotiate this passage as nobly as possible, for the sake of those who are coming after us.
James A. Baldwin