Before science, before the eighteenth century, religion answered the questions, and so in the nineteenth century for instance there was a real jostling between science and religion over the truth and this is why Darwin was so controversial.

Emerson was not passionate about abolition. He wasn't a passionate person. He was a cool intellectual, and I think he probably was a little uncomfortable with passionate people, but he was against slavery.

Making art for me is not fun in the sense of la, la, la, la, but it's something that I find very absorbing and very satisfying.

The American sense of the importance, the fundamental importance of the black-white dichotomy, comes out of societies founded in the era of the African slave trade, so societies like ours, that is to say the western hemisphere, the Caribbean and so forth, we share a lot in common.

Science is a truth that is true no matter what, no matter when and for all time and science as the kind of gospel truth replaces the gospel, which was religion.

You need to do some work even if you have the talent. So I just went the way that was easier, the way I knew what to do, but I have always had the pleasure of the eye. I've always enjoyed color. I'm a knitter.

I'm a professional historian. I do my research. I have a PhD. What does my race have to do with it?