What distinguished my life from my brother's is that my mother didn't like me. When I became a woman, I seemed to repel her.

There's something to be said about a slightly plump person—you have just enough of too much.

The inevitable is no less a shock just because it is inevitable.

Express everything you like. No word can hurt you. None. No idea can hurt you. Not being able to express an idea or word will hurt you more. Like a bullet.

I was given a dictionary when I was seven, and I read it because I had nothing else to read. I read it the way you read a book.

People don't make changes because things are wonderful.

I would be lost without the feeling of antagonism that people have towards me. I write out of defiance.

People only say I’m angry because I’m black and I’m a woman.

A great piece of literature encompasses all that is and all that will be.

...yet a memory cannot be trusted, for so much of the experience of the past is determined by the experience of the present.

I'm so used to being misunderstood.

We need to build a beautiful granite and bronze monument in our nation's capital to honor American heroes, unsung American heroes. And those unsung American heroes are the rich.

Are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?

Affirmative action has been generally cast in terms of race. I think women themselves are not as cognizant of the role affirmative action has played in opening the doors for women.

Confusion and mistakes come when we forget the importance of God's word as our unwavering guide.

No god is absent where prudence dwells.

My parents were of the generation who thought they were the children of a free Czechoslovakia, the only democracy in central Europe.

Imagine a temple inside your mind, a haven from the chaos of the world. Visit often.

Mere good governance is not enough; it has to be pro-people and pro-active. Good governance is putting people at the center of development process.

It wasn't for nothing that the raven was just now croaking on my left hand.

Linguistic sounds, considered as external, physical phenomena have two aspects, the motor and the acoustic.