Quotes About Awareness

One must be careful not to take refuge in any delusion.

I am proud of these people not because of their color but because of their intelligence and their spiritual force and their beauty. The country should be proud of them, too, but, alas, not many people in this country even know of their existence. And the reason for this ignorance is that a knowledge of the role these people played—and play—in American life would reveal more about America to Americans than Americans wish to know.

Life, it is true, is a process of decisions and alternatives, the conscious awareness and acceptance of limitations. Experience, nevertheless, to say nothing of history, seems clearly to indicate that it is not possible to banish or to falsify any human need without ourselves undergoing falsification and loss.

The world sees what it wishes to see, or, when the chips are down, what you tell it to see: it does not wish to see who, or what, or why you are.

White people were, and are, astounded by the holocaust in Germany. They did not know that they could act that way. But I very much doubt whether black people were astounded—at least, in the same way.

The Americans have no sense of doom, none whatever. They do not recognize doom when they see it.

People find it very difficult to act on what they know. To act is to be committed, and to be committed is to be in danger.

The brutality with which Negroes are treated in this country simply cannot be overstated, however unwilling white men may be to hear it. In

And the reason for this ignorance is that a knowledge of the role these people played—and play—in American life would reveal more about America to Americans than Americans wish to know. The

It would help if I were able to feel guilty. But the end of innocence is also the end of guilt.

Men do not like to be protected, it emasculates them. This is what black men know, it is the reality they have lived with; it is what white men do not want to know. It is not a pretty thing to be a father and be ultimately dependent on the power and kindness of some other man for the well-being of your house.

I'm beginning to think,' she said, 'that growing means learning more and more about anguish. That poison becomes your diet-- you drink a little of it everyday. Once you've seen it, you can't stop seeing it-- that's the trouble. And it can, it can' -- she passed her hand wearily over her brown again-- 'drive you mad.

Fonny liked me so much that it didn't occur to him that he loved me. I liked him so much that no other boy was real to me. I didn't see them. I didn't know what this meant. But the waiting moment, which had spied us on the road, and which was waiting for us, knew.

Her long narrow eyes darkened with whatever it was they were beginning to see.

It's astounding the first time you realize that a stranger has a body—the realization that he has a body makes him a stranger. It means that you have a body, too.

And they would not believe me precisely because they knew what I said was true.

The people who think of themselves as White have the choice of becoming human or irrelevant.

I went down again. My heart and I went down again. I was aware of her hand. I was aware of my breathing. I could no longer see it, but I was aware of her face.

They knew his taxi better than they knew him, if you see what I mean. People always know the outside better than they know the inside.

All they really knew were two darknesses, the darkness of their lives, which was now closing in on them, and the darkness of the movies, which had blinded them to that other darkness

I'm beginning to think," she said, "that growing just means learning more and more about anguish. That poison becomes your diet—you drink a little of it every day. Once you've seen it, you can't stop seeing it—that's the trouble. And it can, it can"—she passed her hand wearily over her brow again—"drive you mad.

People are continually pointing out to me the wretchedness of white people in order to console me for the wretchedness of blacks. But an itemized account of the American failure does not console me and it should not console anyone else.

Artists are the only people in a society who will tell that society the truth about itself.

The crime of which you discover slowly you are guilty is not so much that you are aware, which is bad enough, but that other people see that you are and cannot bear to watch it, because it testifies to the fact that they are not.