Rodney

“Anyone who looked more white folkish than herself was better than she was in her criteria, therefore it was right that they should be cruel to her at times, just as she was cruel to those more negroid than herself in direct ratio to their negroness.”
― Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God

“The history of the American Negro is the history of this strife, -- this longing to attain self-conscious manhood, to merge his double self into a better and truer self. In this merging he wishes neither of the older selves to be lost... He simply wishes to make it possible for a man to be both a Negro and an American...”
― W. E. B. DuBois, Souls of Black Folk & Era of Franklin D. Roosevelt 1933-1945 & Movements of the New Left 1950-1975

“Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress.”
― George Eliot, Middlemarch

“Folks, I'm telling you,
birthing is hard
and dying is mean-
so get yourself
a little loving
in between.”
― Langston Hughes