When I pitched headforemost into the world I landed in the crib of Negroism.

When Janie looked out of her door she saw the drifting mists gathered in the west -- that cloud field of the sky -- to arm themselves with thunders and march forth against the world. Louder and higher and lower and wider the sound and motion spread, mounting, sinking, darking.

But for the national welfare, it is urgent to realize that the minorities do think, and think about something other than the race problem.

It seemed to me that the human beings I met reacted pretty much the same to the same stimuli. Different idioms,yes. Circumstances and conditions having power to influence, yes. Inherent difference, no.

Her old thoughts were going to come in handy now, but new words would have to be made and said to fit them.

Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the granddaughter of slaves. It fails to register depression with me.

Now, suppose a Negro does something really magnificent, and I glory, not in the benefit to mankind, but in the fact that the doer was a Negro. Must I not also go hang my head in shame when a member of my race does something execrable? . . . The white race did not go into a laboratory and invent incandescent light. That was Edison. . . . If you are under the impression that every white man is an Edison, just look around a bit.