I love performing. I shall perform until the day I die.

I did take the blows [of life], but I took them with my chin up, in dignity, because I so profoundly love and respect humanity.

We must change the system of education and instruction. Unfortunately, history has shown us that brotherhood must be learned, when it should be natural.

We've got to show that blacks and whites are treated equally in the army. Otherwise, what's the point of waging war on Hitler?

I ran away from St. Louis, and then I ran away from the United States, because of that terror of discrimination.

One day I realized I was living in a country where I was afraid to be black. It was only a country for white people. Not black. So I left. I had been suffocating in the United States... A lot of us left, not because we wanted to leave, but because we couldn't stand it anymore... I felt liberated in Paris.

I like Frenchmen very much, because even when they insult you they do it so nicely.