Ella Wrankle

“The very first thing a writer has to face is that he cannot be told what to write. You know, nobody asked me to be a writer; I chose it. Well, since I'm a man I have to assume I chose it; perhaps in fact, I didn't choose it. But in any case, the one thing you have to do is try to tell the truth. And what everyone overlooks is that in order to do it -- when the book comes out it may hurt you -- but in order for me to do it, it had to hurt me first. I can only tell you about yourself as much as I can face about myself. And this has happened to everybody who's tried to live. You go through life for a long time thinking, No one has ever suffered the way I've suffered, my God, my God. And then you realize -- You read something or you hear something, and you realize that your suffering does not isolate you; your suffering is your bridge. Many people have suffered before you, many people are suffering around you and always will, and all you can do is bring, hopefully, a little light into that suffering. Enough light so that the person who is suffering can begin to comprehend his suffering and begin to live with it and begin to change it, change the situation. We don't change anything; all we can do is invest people with the morale to change it for themselves.”
― James Baldwin