American - Novelist | August 2, 1924 - December 1, 1987
You know, it's not the world that was my oppressor, because what the world does to you, if the world does it to you long enough and effectively enough, you begin to do to yourself.
James Baldwin
YourselfWorldEnoughLongYouKnow
The world is before you and you need not take it or leave it as it was when you came in.
WorldYouNeedLeaveTakeBefore
Love him and let him love you. Do you think anything else under heaven really matters?
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I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.
HatePainPeopleWillImagineGone
Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor.
PovertyPoorExpensiveWhoKnows
To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time.
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It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive.
PeopleMeAliveConnectedThings
Hatred, which could destroy so much, never failed to destroy the man who hated, and this was an immutable law.
ManLawHatredNeverDestroyHated
Life is tragic simply because the earth turns and the sun inexorably rises and sets, and one day, for each of us, the sun will go down for the last, last time.
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The primary distinction of the artist is that he must actively cultivate that state which most men, necessarily, must avoid; the state of being alone.
AloneMenBeing AloneArtistMust
Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does. Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.
LoveWarLove IsGrowing UpThink
There is never time in the future in which we will work out our salvation. The challenge is in the moment; the time is always now.
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