The Harlem of my books was never meant to be real; I never called it real; I just wanted to take it away from the white man if only in my books.

Martyrs are needed to create incidents. Incidents are needed to create revolutions. Revolutions are needed to create progress.

There is an indomitable quality within the human spirit that cannot be destroyed; a face deep within the human personality that is impregnable to all assaults.

Man cannot live without some knowledge of the purpose of life. If he can find no purpose in life he creates one in the inevitability of death.

American violence is public life, it's a public way of life, it became a form, a detective story form. So I should think that any number of black writers should go into the detective story form.

Democracy is not tolerance. Democracy is a prescribed way of life erected on the premise that all men are created equal.

I grew to manhood in the Ohio State Penitentiary.

In fact, no form of death places a greater burden on society than suicide, for the act of suicide is the way a person seeks to resolve his alienation from a cooperative society.

He regretted nothing. Not the way she’d felt in his arms and not the way he’d felt in hers.

I can tell you that solitudeIs not all exaltation, inner spaceWhere the soul breaths and work can be done.Solitude exposes the nerve, Raises up ghosts.The past, never at rest, flows through it.

It's much easier to talk about following Jesus when you are making general statements rather than specific commitments.

Or winters when the sloughs were frozen over and dead and i could walk across the ice and snow between the dead cattails and see nothing but grey skies and dead things and cold

Charismatics have seen pictures of Pope Francis when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires praying and asking Protestant pastors to pray for him. His friendship towards the charismatic renewal is there.

The artificial heart is very effective as a bridge to transplant, but the number of people that can be saved with human hearts is limited. A perfect artificial heart could save many more patients.

Every time you think all the technology that had been created already, all you have to do is look around and then there's someone new who's born with a new idea.

I've always been connected to football, but for some reason, there's never been a connection.