It was my father who could do no wrong. So I didn't think of it as, oh, look, my father's a violent man.

I had only one desire: to dismember it. To see of what it was made, to discover the dearness, to find the beauty, the desirability that had escaped me, but apparently only me.

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.

So this is what insanity is. Not goofy behavior, but watching a sudden change in the world you used to know.

Narrative is radical, creating us at the very moment it is being created.

Was it hard? I hope she didn't die hard.' Sethe shook her head. 'Soft as cream. Being alive was the hard part.

I am a moralist. I worry.