Quotes
“ As we censor these really valuable stories, we are losing empathy in rapid levels throughout our country. ”
— Marley Dias
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: MAR-lee DEE-us
She / Her · Pronounced: MAR-lee DEE-us
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Dias on the cost of banning books that reflect diverse experiences.
Read More: Black Literature
“ Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another. ”
— Toni Morrison
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: TOH-nee MOR-ih-sun
She / Her · Pronounced: TOH-nee MOR-ih-sun
Context From Beloved, her novel of slavery and memory, on the gap between being freed and owning your freedom.
Read More: Black Literature
“ Culture does not make people. People make culture. ”
— Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: chee-mah-MAHN-dah en-GOH-zee ah-DEE-chee
She / Her · Pronounced: chee-mah-MAHN-dah en-GOH-zee ah-DEE-chee
Context Her answer to the defence that inequality is 'just our culture'.
Read More: Black Literature Their Story Nigerian novelist and essayist whose books, including 'Half of a Yellow Sun' and 'Americanah', are read worldwide. Her TEDx talk 'The Danger of a Single Story' and essay 'We Should All Be Feminists' brought her ideas to an audience well beyond literary fiction.
'We Should All Be Feminists' is a short, direct entry point before the novels. See Their Full Story
“ Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. ”
— James Baldwin
Literature Black LGBTQ+ He / Him · Pronounced: JAYMZ BAWLD-win
He / Him · Pronounced: JAYMZ BAWLD-win
Context Baldwin on the necessity of facing hard truths before anything can change.
Read More: Black Literature Their Story Novelist and essayist whose work on race, sexuality and belonging in America remains central reading. Born in Harlem in 1924, he wrote much of his sharpest work from France, at a distance that let him see his country clearly.
'The Fire Next Time' and 'Giovanni's Room' are the usual entry points. See Their Full Story
“ You don't have to change the whole world, but by changing your thinking, you can change your actions, and then by changing your actions, you can change your community. ”
— Marley Dias
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: MAR-lee DEE-us
She / Her · Pronounced: MAR-lee DEE-us
Source: Interview on #1000BlackGirlBooks campaign · original link to be verified
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Dias, who founded a campaign to collect books centring Black girls, on the scale of change she's aiming for.
Read More: Black Literature
“ The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. ”
— Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: chee-mah-MAHN-dah en-GOH-zee ah-DEE-chee
She / Her · Pronounced: chee-mah-MAHN-dah en-GOH-zee ah-DEE-chee
Context From her TED talk, on how one-dimensional narratives flatten whole peoples.
Read More: Black Literature Their Story Nigerian novelist and essayist whose books, including 'Half of a Yellow Sun' and 'Americanah', are read worldwide. Her TEDx talk 'The Danger of a Single Story' and essay 'We Should All Be Feminists' brought her ideas to an audience well beyond literary fiction.
'We Should All Be Feminists' is a short, direct entry point before the novels. See Their Full Story
“ The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any. ”
— Alice Walker
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: AL-iss WAWK-er
She / Her · Pronounced: AL-iss WAWK-er
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Walker, author of The Color Purple, on reclaiming power that people assume they do not have.
Read More: Black Literature
“ Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare. ”
— Audre Lorde
Literature Women LGBTQ+ Black She / Her · Pronounced: AW-dree LORD
She / Her · Pronounced: AW-dree LORD
Context Written while Lorde was living with cancer. She meant survival as resistance, not self-care as a treat.
Read More: Black Literature Their Story Poet, essayist and librarian who described herself as 'black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet.' Born in New York in 1934 to Caribbean immigrant parents, she used poetry and essays to name what others left unsaid about race, sexuality, class and illness.
Her essays 'The Master's Tools' and 'Uses of the Erotic' reward the full text. See Their Full Story
“ A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction. ”
— Virginia Woolf
Literature Women LGBTQ+ She / Her · Pronounced: ver-JIN-ee-uh WOOLF
She / Her · Pronounced: ver-JIN-ee-uh WOOLF
Context From her essay on women and fiction, arguing that creativity needs money, independence and space.
Read More: LGBTQ+ Voices
“ People will never forget how you made them feel. ”
— Maya Angelou
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: MY-uh AN-juh-loh
She / Her · Pronounced: MY-uh AN-juh-loh
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context A line Angelou returned to often, on how people remember feeling more than fact.
Read More: Black Literature
“ There are years that ask questions and years that answer. ”
— Zora Neale Hurston
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: ZOR-uh NEEL HUR-stun
She / Her · Pronounced: ZOR-uh NEEL HUR-stun
Context From her novel of a Black woman's search for selfhood in the early-twentieth-century South.
Read More: Black Literature
“ In order to rise from its own ashes, a phoenix first must burn. ”
— Octavia Butler
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: ok-TAY-vee-uh BUT-ler
She / Her · Pronounced: ok-TAY-vee-uh BUT-ler
Context Butler, a pioneering Black science-fiction writer, on renewal through hardship.
Read More: Black Literature
“ What is beautiful is good, and who is good will soon be beautiful. ”
— Sappho
Literature Women LGBTQ+ She / Her · Pronounced: SAF-oh
She / Her · Pronounced: SAF-oh
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Sappho of Lesbos is one of the earliest recorded women poets.
Read More: LGBTQ+ Voices
“ Where there is a tree to plant, plant it yourself. ”
— Gabriela Mistral
Literature Women Latinx Global South She / Her · Pronounced: gah-bree-EL-ah mees-TRAHL
She / Her · Pronounced: gah-bree-EL-ah mees-TRAHL
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Chilean poet and the first Latin American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Read More: Latinx Voices
“ There is no story that is not true. ”
— Chinua Achebe
Literature Black Global South He / Him · Pronounced: CHIN-wah ah-CHAY-bay
He / Him · Pronounced: CHIN-wah ah-CHAY-bay
Context From Things Fall Apart, the novel that reshaped how African stories were told in fiction.
Read More: Black Literature
“ I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go. ”
— Langston Hughes
Literature Black LGBTQ+ He / Him · Pronounced: LANG-stun HYOOZ
He / Him · Pronounced: LANG-stun HYOOZ
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Hughes, a central figure of the Harlem Renaissance, on quiet determination.
Read More: Black Literature
“ If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it. ”
— Toni Morrison
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: TOH-nee MOR-ih-sun
She / Her · Pronounced: TOH-nee MOR-ih-sun
Context Morrison on writing the book you wish existed, from a Nobel laureate and towering voice in American letters.
Read More: Black Literature
“ I did not lose myself all at once. I rubbed out my face over the years. ”
— Amy Tan
Literature Women Asian She / Her · Pronounced: AY-mee TAHN
She / Her · Pronounced: AY-mee TAHN
Context From The Joy Luck Club, on the slow erosion of self across a life.
Read More: Asian Voices
“ Your silence will not protect you. ”
— Audre Lorde
Literature Women LGBTQ+ Black She / Her · Pronounced: AW-dree LORD
She / Her · Pronounced: AW-dree LORD
Context Written as she faced a cancer diagnosis, on the cost of staying quiet.
Read More: Black Literature Their Story Poet, essayist and librarian who described herself as 'black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet.' Born in New York in 1934 to Caribbean immigrant parents, she used poetry and essays to name what others left unsaid about race, sexuality, class and illness.
Her essays 'The Master's Tools' and 'Uses of the Erotic' reward the full text. See Their Full Story
“ You are the storyteller of your own life. ”
— Isabel Allende
Literature Women Latinx Global South She / Her · Pronounced: EE-sah-bel ah-YEN-day
She / Her · Pronounced: EE-sah-bel ah-YEN-day
Widely credited to this person; primary source not yet confirmed.
Context Allende, among the most widely read Spanish-language authors, on authorship over one's own life.
Read More: Latinx Voices
“ There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you. ”
— Maya Angelou
Literature Women Black She / Her · Pronounced: MY-uh AN-juh-loh
She / Her · Pronounced: MY-uh AN-juh-loh
Context From her first autobiography, on silence after childhood trauma.
Read More: Black Literature
