There in the center of that silence was not eternity but the death of time and a loneliness so profound the word itself had no meaning.

The race thing is sort of a misnomer. It's just the human race, right? That's it. The rest of it, and racism, is socially constructed. Nobody is born racist, no one. What happens is other things that are usually based on power, money, feeling good about yourself, or bad about yourself, those things play into hating other people for whatever reason.

The enemy is not men. The enemy is the concept of patriarchy, the concept of patriarchy as the way to run the world or do things.

Like Guitar in Son of Solomon, and Son in Tar Baby, he believed that harmony could never exist between the races.

The presence of evil was something to be first recognized, then dealt with, survived, outwitted, triumphed over.

There is no civilization that did not begin with art, Whether it was drawing a line in the sand, painting a cave or dancing.

I always start out with an idea, even a boring idea, that becomes a question I don't have answers to.