Buried In Print

“The principal function of racist ideas in American history has been the suppression of resistance to racial discrimination and its resulting racial disparities. The beneficiaries of slavery, segregation, and mass incarceration have produced racist ideas of Black people being best suited for or deserving of the confines of slavery, segregation, or the jail cell. Consumers of these racist ideas have been led to believe there is something wrong with Black people, and not the policies that have enslaved, oppressed, and confined so many Black people.”
― Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America

“We are surrounded by story.”
― Alice McDermott

“Do you know why people like me are shy about being capitalists? Well, its because we, for as long as we have known you, were capital, like bales of cotton and sacks of sugar, and you were commanding, cruel capitalists, and the memory of this so strong, the experience so recent, that we can't quite bring ourselves to embrace this idea that you think so much of. As for hat we were like before we met you, I no longer care. No periods of time over which my ancestors held sway, no documentation of complex civilisations, is any comfort to me. Even if I really came from people who were living like monkeys in trees, it was better to be that than what happened to me, what I became after I met you.”
― Jamaica Kincaid, A Small Place

“I want to look at the work. I don’t care if its white or black. I don’t agree that “If you’re white, you can’t write”. I want to see what they can do. I also don’t believe that because I am a man, I can’t write about women. I had better quit writing, if I can’t write about women. Why can’t women write about men? It’s talent that’s important.”
― Leon Forrest, Conversations with Leon Forrest