Literature Quotes

"The writer must dig deeper than convention allows."

"The eyes are not here; there are no eyes here, in this valley of dying stars."

"Tell them that I was a writer, a teller of stories."

"Folk tales are the boiled-down juice of human experience."

"The mind of the Negro is being shaped by the literature he reads."

"The writer is necessarily the voice of the voiceless and the conscience of the people."

"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read."

"The writer is delegated to discover and reveal the truth about the society in which he lives."

"The writer's responsibility is to excavate those depths and to tell us all that he finds."

"The writer's only responsibility is to his art and his conscience."

"The purpose of my writing is the liberation of myself and of my reader."

"Literature opens doors to other worlds."

"Every person has a story worth telling."

"The profession of book writing makes horse racing seem like a solid, stable business."

"Tragedy requires a noble character, but comedy can afford any."

"The book you read is not inert; it is alive with the author's consciousness."

"The only thing worth writing about is the human heart in conflict with itself."

"I have written what I had to write."

"A writer doesn't solve problems, he exposes them."

"In all my years of writing, I have tried to reveal the life of those struggling, those who do not appear in the headlines."

"I believe in the power of words to change minds and hearts."

"I learned that the most important stories are the quiet ones."

"All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened."

"An author ought to write for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmasters of ever after."

"The difference between a good writer and a great writer is mostly editing."

"Writing is easy. You only have to cross out the wrong words."

"The real Negro hasn't been written about yet."

"The old women gathered in the shade and told their stories."

"The power of story is the power to change the world."

"You think your pain and heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read."