What 'jazz' means to me is the worst kind of working conditions, the worst in cultural prejudice. The term 'jazz' has come to mean the abuse and exploitation of black musicians.

All human beings have gray little souls-and they all want to rouge them up.

Keep reading books, but remember that a book’s only a book, and you should learn to think for yourself.

One word of praise from a woman is dearer to me than a whole ode from a man . .

All of us are pilgrims on this earth. I've even heard people say that the earth itself is a pilgrim in the heavens.

We kill everybody, my dear. Some with bullets, some with words, and everybody with our deeds. We drive people into their graves, and neither see it nor feel it.

If it is true that only misfortune can awaken a man's soul, it is a bitter truth, one that is hard to hear and accept, and it is only natural that many people deny it and say it is better for a man to live on in a trance than to wake up to torture.