I do not think white America is committed to granting equality to the American Negro... this is a passionately racist country; it will continue to be so in the foreseeable future.

The wisdom of literature is quite antithetical to having opinions. 'Nothing is my last word about anything,' said Henry James. Furnishing opinions, even correct opinions - whenever asked - cheapens what novelists and poets do best, which is to sponsor reflectiveness, to pursue complexity. Information will never replace illumination.

the process of building a self and its works is always too slow. One is always in arrears to oneself.

In good films, there is always a directness that entirely frees us from the itch to interpret.

Everything should be understood, and anything can be transformed - that is the modern view.

As photographs give people an imaginary possession of a past that is unreal, they also help people to take possession of space in which they are insecure.

This is the beauty that emerges from self-confidence, class confidence. That says, I am not born to please. I am born to be pleased.