“Everybody talking ’bout heaven ain’t going there!”

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.

Take away the violence and who will hear the man of peace?

Never be afraid to sit a while and think.

Obviously the most oppressed of any oppressed group will be its women

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.’

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…

I want to fly! I want to touch the sun!” “Finish your eggs first.

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.

I think that the human race does command its own destiny and that that destiny can eventually embrace the stars.

I was born black and female.

One cannot live with sighted eyes and feeling heart and not know and read of the miseries which affect the world.

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.

Children see things very well sometimes and idealists even better.

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–

There may be women to emerge who will be able to formulate a new and possible concept that homosexual persecution and condemnation has at its roots not only social ignorance, but a philosophically active anti-feminist dogma.

A woman who is willing to be herself and pursue her own potential runs not so much the risk of loneliness, as the challenge of exposure to more interesting men – and people in general.

Writing lyrics with your wife does lead to talking about yourselves a lot. But this is not an autobiographical account of my personal marriage. It’s almost about the marriage of the band.

A lot of people get flipped out if you’re quiet. They say stuff like, What are you thinking? And if they don’t start interrogating you, they start talking, going on and on about stuff that’s totally irrelevant, and the silence gets so big and loud that it’s scary.

Talking to Yogi Berra about baseball is like talking to Homer about the Gods.

Stop talking about the problem and start thinking about the solution.

If I talked I would become like any other comedian.

A dog is not considered a good dog because he is a good barker. a man is not considered a good man because he is a good talker.

When I get ready to talk to people, I spend two thirds of the time thinking what they want to hear and one third thinking about what I want to say.

A man is not called wise because he talks and talks again; but if he is peaceful, loving and fearless then he is in truth called wise.