Olisa > Olisa's Quotes

“I owe everything I am and everything I will ever be to books.”
― Gary Paulsen, Shelf Life: Stories by the Book

“The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. Somebody says you have no language and you spend twenty years proving that you do. Somebody says your head isn’t shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdoms, so you dredge that up. None of this is necessary. There will always be one more thing.”
― Toni Morrison

“I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.”
― John Burroughs

“From that time on, the world was hers for the reading. She would never be lonely again, never miss the lack of intimate friends. Books became her friends and there was one for every mood. There was poetry for quiet companionship. There was adventure when she tired of quiet hours. There would be love stories when she came into adolescence and when she wanted to feel a closeness to someone she could read a biography. On that day when she first knew she could read, she made a vow to read one book a day as long as she lived.”
― Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

“I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no ‘brief candle’ to me. It is sort of a splendid torch which I have a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it over to future generations.”
― George Bernard Shaw

“if we wanted to. people of color could burn the world down. for what we have experienced. are experiencing. but we don’t. – how stunningly beautiful that our sacred respect for the earth. for life. is deeper than our rage”
― Nayyirah Waheed, salt.

“The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!”
― William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

“All my life I had to fight. I had to fight my daddy. I had to fight my brothers. I had to fight my cousins and my uncles. A girl child ain't safe in a family of men. But I never thought I'd have to fight in my own house. She let out her breath. I loves Harpo, she say. God knows I do. But I'll kill him dead before I let him beat me.”
― Alice Walker, The Color Purple

“We live in a world of guided missiles
and misguided men".”
― Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.”
― Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God

“Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose.”
― Zora Neale Hurston

“I will fight for my country, but I will not lie for her.”
― Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road

“If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it.”
― Zora Neale Hurston

“I stood at the border, stood at the edge and claimed it as central. l claimed it as central, and let the rest of the world move over to where I was.”
― Toni Morrison