A couple of years I taught in graduate programs at NYU and Columbia, in the early eighties.

I am aware of the changes, but in no sense am I believer that we live in a post-racial society. That's a description of our inheritance and that is theirs, which is inescapable. It is doesn't matter if you are from New England or Mississippi. You're an American. It doesn't matter if you are white, black, brown, or Asian. It is part of American society. You'd have to be blind, deaf, or dumb not to know it. The emphasis on color or the fear of it, is all part of the same dark flower. I am trying to point to that and to bring it all the way back from Senegal.

The 60s passed and faded and I grew older, and in 1987 bought a house in upstate New York, and it turned out that John Brown was buried down the road from my house and that he had lived there longer than anywhere else and his house was still standing.

One hates a person for the same reason one loves him

Much more than memoir; it's history.

First of all it's usually women who run these higher primate sanctuaries, rarely men. They are white. They come from privileged backgrounds. They are educated.

Public libraries are the sole community centers left in America. The degree to which a branch of the local library is connected to the larger culture is a reflection of the degree to which the community itself is connected to the larger culture.