People don't do right because of the fear of God or love of him. You do right because the world doesn't make sense if you don't.

Two or three things I know for sure, and one of them is that if we are not beautiful to each other, we cannot know beauty in any form.

Change, when it comes, cracks everything open.

Things come apart so easily when they have been held together with lies.

Fiction is a piece of truth that turns lies to meaning.

Two or three things I know for sure, and one of them is the way you can both hate and love something you are not sure you understand.

I did not begin with craft, I began with strong feelings and worked toward craft.

Class, race, sexuality, gender and all other categories by which we categorize and dismiss each other need to be excavated from the inside.

One of the strengths I derive from my class background is that I am accustomed to contempt.

The only magic we have is what we make in ourselves, the muscles we build up on the inside, the sense of belief we create from nothing.

I have wanted everything as a writer and a woman, but most of all a world changed utterly by my revelations.

Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking.

We stand the risk of a standstill, because you refused to take risks. So life demands risks.

My favorite kind of humor is basically, if it was happening to you, it wouldn't be funny, but to observe it, it's hilarious.

Science is no substitute for virtue; the heart is as necessary for a good life as the head.

All women deserve access to care that can save their lives.

Wouldst thou be famed? have those high acts in view, Brave men would act though scandal would ensue.

Practice love in your relationships. The key to this is avoiding expectation. It's expectation that makes most people miserable in love - the return on the investment.

Lo, sleep is good, better is death--in sooth The best of all were never to be born.

It is now time for our nation to frustrate the wild dreams of the whites.

On the road again, goin' places that I've never been. Seein' things that I may never see again, and I can't wait to get on the road again.