you got two feet, Sethe, not four." he said, and right then a forest sprang up between them; tactless and quiet.

You are your best thing

In becoming an American, from Europe, what one has in common with that other immigrant is contempt for me-it's nothing else but color.

Like friendship, hatred needed more than physical intimacy; it wanted creativity and hard work to sustain itself

Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence; does more than represent the limits of knowledge; it limits knowledge.

We mistook violence for passion, indolence for leisure, and thought recklessness was freedom.

Being good to somebody is just like being mean to somebody. Risky. You don't get nothing for it.