American straightforwardness is almost as disarming as Americans invariably think it is.
LORRAINE HANSBERRYI was born black and female.
More Lorraine Hansberry Quotes
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Seems like God don’t see fit to give the black man nothing but dreams – but He did give us children to make them dreams seem worthwhile.
LORRAINE HANSBERRY -
Do I remain a revolutionary? Intellectually — without a doubt. But am I prepared to give my body to the struggle or even my comforts? This is what I puzzle about.
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I think that the glorious thing about the human race is that it does change the world — constantly. The world or ‘life’ may seem to more often overwhelm the human being’s capacity for struggling against being overwhelmed which is remarkable and exhilarating.
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Obviously the most oppressed of any oppressed group will be its women
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Ah, I like the look of packing crates! A household in preparation for a journey! … Something full of the flow of life, do you understand? Movement, progress…
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What you ain’t never understood is that I ain’t got nothing, don’t own nothing, ain’t never really wanted nothing that wasn’t for you. There ain’t nothing as precious to me…There ain’t nothing worth holding on to, money, dreams, nothing else–
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It’s dangerous, son.’ ‘What’s dangerous?’ ‘When a man goes outside his house to look for peace.
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It is difficult for the American mind to adjust to the realization that the Rhetts and the Scarletts were as much monsters as the keepers of Buchenwald-they just dressed more attractively.
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Sometimes, I can see the future stretched out in front of me – just as plain as day. The future hanging over there at the edge of my days. Just waiting for me.
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Big Walter used to say, he’d get right wet in the eyes sometimes, lean his head back with the water standing in his eyes and say, ‘Seem like God didn’t see fit to give the black man nothing but dreams – but He did give us children to make them dreams seem worth while.’
LORRAINE HANSBERRY -
The grim possibility is that she who ‘hides her brains’ will, more than likely, end up with a mate who is only equal to a woman with ‘hidden brains’ or none at all.
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Ball points belong to their age. They make everyone write alike.
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I think that the human race does command its own destiny and that that destiny can eventually embrace the stars.
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[T]here is only one large circle that we march in, around and around, each of us with our own little picture — in front of us — our own little mirage that we think is the future.
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I care. I care about it all. It takes too much energy not to care.
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The thing that makes you exceptional, if you are at all, is inevitably that which must also make you lonely.
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I believe that one of the most sound ideas in dramatic writing is that in order to create the universal, you must pay very great attention to the specific. Universality, I think, emerges from truthful identity of what is.
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Though it be a thrilling and marvellous thing to be merely young and gifted in such times, it is doubly so – doubly dynamic – to be young, gifted and black.
LORRAINE HANSBERRY -
I want to fly! I want to touch the sun!” “Finish your eggs first.
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When a man knows that the abstraction ten exists – nothing on earth can stop him from looking for the fact of eleven.
LORRAINE HANSBERRY -
I happen to believe that most people – and this is where I differ from many of my contemporaries, or at least as they express themselves – I think that virtually every human being is dramatically interesting. Not only is he dramatically interesting, he is a creature of stature whoever he is.
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I was born black and female.
LORRAINE HANSBERRY -
Children see things very well sometimes and idealists even better.
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Beneatha: You didn’t tell us what Alaiyo means… for all I know, you might be calling me Little Idiot or something… … Asagai: It means… it means One for Whom Bread–Food–Is Not Enough.
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Everybody talking ’bout heaven ain’t going there!
LORRAINE HANSBERRY -
Never be afraid to sit a while and think.
LORRAINE HANSBERRY