My world did not shrink because I was a black female writer. It just got bigger.

I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer - its dust and lowering skies.

If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.

The function of freedom is to free someone else.

Don’t beg anybody for anything, especially love.

There is no such thing as race. None. There is just a human race - scientifically, anthropologically. Racism is a construct, a social construct... it has a social function, racism.

There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.

If there's a book you really want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.

In times of dread, artists must never choose to remain silent.

All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was.

Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence; does more than represent the limits of knowledge; it limits knowledge.

You don´t need a stage to prove that you´re a bad speaker.

Awaiting within us is something beyond our thoughts and beliefs.

Greatness comes not in possessing security, but in withstanding insecurity.

All right, baby, " Daphne crooned."Talk to Mama and tell me all your secrets. . . .

Ohh, ' said the girl with a sad tilt of her

A lot of people are afraid to tell the truth, to say no. That's where toughness comes into play. Toughness is not being a bully. It's having backbone.

I abhor, too, the roaming lover, nor do I drink from every well; I loathe all things in common

The locker room talk is always that about who can beat who.

I would like to thank my parents in Vergaio, a little village in Italy. They gave me the biggest gift: poverty.

If you don't love yourself, I'll make you see your own heart.