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.

American means white, and Africanist people struggle to make the term applicable to themselves with ethnicity and hyphen after hyphen after hyphen.

I sang "O Holy Night" in a school choir. My mother came and listened to me and complimented me. So that was the high point. I cannot sing a note.

I wrote my first novel because I wanted to read it.

Today is always here,' said Sethe. 'Tomorrow, never.

If we had no language we'd have nothing.

Each member of the family in his own cell of consciousness, each making his own patchwork quilt of reality - collecting fragments of experience here, pieces of information there. From the tiny impressions gleaned from one another, they created a sense of belonging and tried to make do with the way they found each other.