21 quotes
Love, I find is like singing. Everybody can do enough to satisfy themselves, though it may not impress the neighbors as being very much.
Dust Tracks on a Road (1942)
Gods always behave like the people who make them.
Tell My Horse (1938)
Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose. It is a seeking that he who wishes may know the cosmic secrets of the world and they that dwell therein.
Dust Tracks on a Road (1942)
Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to "jump at de sun." We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.
Dust Tracks on a Road (1942)
There are years that ask questions and years that answer.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
If you haven’t got it, you can’t show it. If you have got it, you can’t hide it.
Dust Tracks on a Road (1942)
Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me.
How It Feels to Be Colored Me (1928)
I am crazy about the idea of Democracy. I want to see how it feels.
I accept this idea of democracy. I am all for trying it out.
The years took all the fight out of Janie’s face. For a while she thought it was gone from her soul.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
Ah done been in sorrow's kitchen and Ah done licked out all de pots. Ah done died in grief and been buried in de bitter waters, and Ah done rose agin from de dead lak Lazarus.
Lucy in Jonah's Gourd Vine (1934)
‘So de white man throw down de load and tell de nigger man tuh pick it up. He pick it up because he have to, but he donʼt tote it. He hand it to his womenfolks. De nigger woman is de mule uh de world so fur as Ah can see.’
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
"It’s uh known fact, Pheoby, you got tuh go there tuh know there. Yo’ papa and yo’ mama and nobody else can’t tell yuh and show yuh. Two things everybody’s got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin’ fuh theyselves."
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
‘But youʼse takinʼ uh awful chance.’
‘No moʼ than Ah took befoʼ and no moʼ than anybody else takes when dey gits married. It always changes folks, and sometimes it brings out dirt and meanness dat even de person didnʼt know they had in ʼem theyselves.’
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
The wind came back with triple fury, and put out the light for the last time. They sat in company with the others in other shanties, their eyes straining against crude walls and their souls asking if He meant to measure their puny might against His. They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
I am colored but I offer nothing in the way of extenuating circumstances except the fact that I am the only Negro in the United States whose grandfather on the mother's side was not an Indian chief.
How It Feels to Be Colored Me (1928)
All gods who receive homage are cruel. All gods dispense suffering without reason. Otherwise they would not be worshipped. Through indiscriminate suffering men know fear and fear is the most divine emotion. It is the stones for altars and the beginning of wisdom. Half gods are worshipped in wine and flowers. Real gods require blood.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
Of course he wasn't dead. He could never be dead until she herself had finished feeling and thinking. The kiss of his memory made pictures of love and light against the wall. Here was peace. She pulled in her horizon like a great fish-net. Pulled it from around the waist of the world and draped it over her shoulder. So much of life in its meshes! She called in her soul to come and see.
Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)