Black women have always been friends. I mean, if you didn't have each other you had nothing.

How come it can’t fly no better than a chicken?’ Milkman asked. Too much tail. All that jewelry weighs it down. Like vanity. Can’t nobody fly with all that [stuff]. Wanna fly, you got to give up the [stuff] that weighs you down.’ The peacock jumped onto the hood of the Buick and once more spread its tail, sending the flashy Buick into oblivion.

When am I happy and when am I sad and what is the difference? What do I need to know to stay alive? What is true in the world?

What I think the political correctness debate is really about is the power to be able to define. The definers want the power to name. And the defined are now taking that power away from them.

If you can only be tall because someone else is on their knees, then you have a serious problem. And white people have a very, very serious problem.

Sifting daylight dissolves the memory, turns it into dust motes floating in light.

I'm interested in the way in which the past affects the present and I think that if we understand a good deal more about history, we automatically understand a great more about contemporary life.