Chester Himes Quotes

Martyrs are needed to create incidents. Incidents are needed to create revolutions. Revolutions are needed to create progress.

There is an indomitable quality within the human spirit that cannot be destroyed; a face deep within the human personality that is impregnable to all assaults.

Man cannot live without some knowledge of the purpose of life. If he can find no purpose in life he creates one in the inevitability of death.

American violence is public life, it's a public way of life, it became a form, a detective story form. So I should think that any number of black writers should go into the detective story form.

Democracy is not tolerance. Democracy is a prescribed way of life erected on the premise that all men are created equal.

I grew to manhood in the Ohio State Penitentiary.

The Harlem of my books was never meant to be real; I never called it real; I just wanted to take it away from the white man if only in my books.