Whence all this passion toward conformity anyway?—diversity is the word.

—Ralph Ellison

I tell my students there is such a thing as “writer’s block,” and they should respect it. It’s blocked because it ought to be blocked, because you haven’t got it right now.

—Toni Morrison

You cannot teach what you don’t know. You cannot give energy if you’re not on fire on the inside.

—Jesse Jackson

The Negro was invented in America.

—John Oliver Killens

You know what religion is? You got ta live religion. You got ta do religion. You got ta live Right.

—Mance Lipscomb

I am not afraid to trust my sisters—not I.

—Angelina Grimké

At first color doesn’t mean very much to little children, black or white. Only as they grow older and absorb poisons from adults does color begin to blind them.

—Roy Wilkins

Our feelings are our most genuine paths to knowledge. They are chaotic, sometimes painful, sometimes contradictory, but they come from deep within us. And we must key into those feelings…. This is how new visions begin.

—Audre Lorde

Everybody loves a fool, but nobody wants him for a son.

—Malinke Proverb

It is only what is written upon the soul of man that will survive the wreck of time.

—Francis Grimké