I think I have a pugnacious style. My style is not pretty. I don't use words like "amber" or "opaque."

I finally had to go to the American Civil Liberties Union here in northern California to get my reply published to what I considered to be a hatchet job done by Stanley Crouch.

Ethnic life in the United States has become a sort of contest like baseball in which the blacks are always the Chicago Cubs.

No one says a novel has to be one thing. It can be anything it wants to be, a vaudeville show, the six o’clock news, the mumblings of wild men saddled by demons.

The treatment of African and African American culture in our education was no different from their treatment in Tarzan movies.

Writing poetry is the hard manual labor of the imagination.

I used to be a discipline problem, which caused me embarrassment until I realized that being a discipline problem in a racist society is sometimes an honor.

One of the joys of reading is the ability to plug into the shared wisdom of mankind.

I consider racism to be a medical problem. Racists need serious medical and psychiatric help, because they are killing themselves and making others suffer along with them.

I'm sure that you could go back and make a graph showing that all the killings of black males increased in times of economic difficulty. As a matter of fact, a black man was lynched last year.

Multicultural is not a description of a category of American writing-it is a definition of all American writing.

Science & Love have progressed "either" ways with growth of violence!

It is in our faults and failings, not in our virtues, that we touch one another and find sympathy. We differ widely enough in our nobler qualities. It is in our follies that we are at one.

If you have love in your life, it can make up for a great many things that are missing. If you don't have love in your life, no matter what else there is, it's not enough.

In our present state of degeneration it is through the skin that metaphysics must be made to re-enter our minds.

I have little compassion for people in trailer parks who refuse to move after getting tornado warnings. How hard is it for them to relocate? Their houses have wheels.

Don't depend on others to give you strength....Find it within yourself

Nothing in life is fun for the whole family. There are no massage parlors with ice cream and free jewelry.

The kick [of comedy] is to think quickly. It's a great kick.

My mom is always telling me it takes a long time to get to the top, but a short time to get to the bottom.

Attitude is a choice. Think positive thoughts daily. Believe in yourself.