"

Nobody loves the head of a dandelion. Maybe because they are so many, strong, and soon.

"

That anybody white could take your whole self for anything that came to mind. Not just work, kill, or maim you, but dirty you so bad you forgot who yo...more

"

The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, you...more

"

I always looked upon the acts of racist exclusion, or insult, as pitiable, for the other person. I never absorbed that. I always thought that there wa...more

"

In this country American means white. Everybody else has to hyphenate.

"

It comforts everybody to think of all Negroes as dirt poor, and to regard those who were not, who earned good money and kept it, as some kind of shame...more

"

Whitepeople believed that whatever the manners, under every dark skin was a jungle. Swift unnavigable waters, swinging screaming baboons, sleeping sna...more

"

Here was an ugly little girl asking for beauty....A little black girl who wanted to rise up out of the pit of her blackness and see the world with blu...more