“It was not a matter of believing or disbelieving what I read, but of feeling something new, of being affected by something that made the look of the world different.”

I could think of nothing. And, slowly, it was upon exactly that nothingness that my mind began to dwell, that constant sense of wanting without having, of being hated without reason.

I did not know if the story was factually true or not, but it was emotionally true […].

And they do not know why; they are powerless pawns in a blind play of social forces.

What could I dream of that had the barest possibility of coming true?

We invented a medium of exchange, mined silver and gold, made pottery and cutlery, we fashioned tools and utensils of brass, bronze, ivory, quartz, and granite.

Reluctantly, he comes to the conclusion that to account for his book is to account for his life.

We had our own literature, our own systems of law, religion, medicine, science, and education.

The holy and the evil, the high and the low, the white and the black; our America is frightened of fact, of history, of processes, of necessity.

Goddamnit, look! We live here and they live there.

I made things happen within. Because my environment was bare and bleak,

But to feel that there was feeling denied me, that the very breath of life itself was beyond my reach, that more than anything else hurt, wounded me. I had a new hunger.

Make up your mind, Snail! You are half inside your house, And halfway out!

I was not leaving the south to forget the south, but so that some day I might understand it

In me was shaping a yearning for a kind of consciousness.

The more closely the author thinks of why he wrote, the more he comes to regard his imagination as a kind of self-generating cement which glued his facts together, and his emotions as a kind of dark and obscure designer of those facts.

The artist must bow to the monster of his own imagination.

There is only one way in the world to be distinguished. Follow your instinct! Be yourself, and you’ll be somebody. Be one more blind follower of the blind, and you will have the oblivion you desire.

I logically don’t believe that all this stuff [surrounding us] is generated from dust. But I’m also not like “Jesus Christ came down to save us.” It’s almost selfish to think that human beings, on this plane of reality, are the end of it.

Some values must be universal, like human rights and the equal worth of every human being.

In our community, we have a duty to strengthen the weakest among us to build a better society.

You cannot fail at being yourself. A cat doesn’t try to be a tiger, and you shouldn’t try to be something you aren’t. You are a process, not a product. Your job is to discover what you are and create that creature.

Women need a reason to have sex, men just need a place.

My friends and I are crazy. That’s the only thing that keeps us sane!

That’s the difference between me and the rest of the world. Happiness isn’t good enough for me! I demand euphoria!