We don't all dig Shakespeare uniformly, or even 'Little Red Riding Hood.' The understanding of art depends finally upon one's willingness to extend one's humanity and one's knowledge of human life.
Ralph EllisonAnd I knew that it was better to live out one's absurdity than to die for that of others.
Ralph EllisonLife is to be lived, not controlled, and humanity is won by continuing to play in face of certain defeat.
Ralph EllisonThe blues is an art of ambiguity, an assertion of the irrepressibly human over all circumstance whether created by others or by one's own human failings. They are the only consistent art in the United States which constantly remind us of our limitations while encouraging us to see how far we can actually go. When understood in their more profound implication, they are a corrective, an attempt to draw a line upon man's own limitless assertion.
Ralph Ellison