James Baldwin Quotes

Most popular James Baldwin Quotes

Freedom is not something that anybody can be given; freedom is something people take and people are as free as they want to be. - James Baldwin quote.
Freedom is not something that anybody can be given; freedom is something people take and people are as free as they want to be.
— James Baldwin Nobody Knows My Name

freedom

The future is like heaven—everyone exalts it but no one wants to go there now. - James Baldwin quote.
The future is like heaven—everyone exalts it but no one wants to go there now.
— James Baldwin Nobody Knows My Name

future

All art is a kind of confession, more or less oblique. - James Baldwin quote.
All art is a kind of confession, more or less oblique.
— James Baldwin Nobody Knows My Name

art

Hatred, which could destroy so much, never failed to destroy the man who hated and this was an immutable law. - James Baldwin quote.
Hatred, which could destroy so much, never failed to destroy the man who hated and this was an immutable law.
— James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son

hate

Ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have. - James Baldwin quote.
Ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.
— James Baldwin No Name in the Street

justice ignorance power

You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive. - James Baldwin quote.
You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive.
— James Baldwin

pain heartbreak

Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them. - James Baldwin quote.
Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.
— James Baldwin

parenting children role models example

Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. - James Baldwin quote.
Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.
— James Baldwin The Progressive

love

Most of us are about as eager to be changed as we were to be born, and go through our changes in a similar state of shock. - James Baldwin quote.
Most of us are about as eager to be changed as we were to be born, and go through our changes in a similar state of shock.
— James Baldwin New York

change changing people

To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time. - James Baldwin quote.
To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time.
— James Baldwin in Time

African-Americans

The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions which have been hidden by the answers. - James Baldwin quote.
The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions which have been hidden by the answers.
— James Baldwin Creative America

art

The root function of language is to control the universe by describing it. - James Baldwin quote.
The root function of language is to control the universe by describing it.
— James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son

language

The world is before you, and you need not take it or leave it as it was when you came in. - James Baldwin quote.
The world is before you, and you need not take it or leave it as it was when you came in.
— James Baldwin

change the world inspirational

Nothing is more desirable than to be released from an affliction, but nothing is more frightening than to be divested of a crutch. - James Baldwin quote.
Nothing is more desirable than to be released from an affliction, but nothing is more frightening than to be divested of a crutch.
— James Baldwin

interesting

To defend oneself against a fear is simply to insure that one will, one day, be conquered by it; fears must be faced. - James Baldwin quote.
To defend oneself against a fear is simply to insure that one will, one day, be conquered by it; fears must be faced.
— James Baldwin

fear

Money, it turned out, was exactly like sex, you thought of nothing else if you didn't have it and thought of other things if you did. - James Baldwin quote.
Money, it turned out, was exactly like sex, you thought of nothing else if you didn't have it and thought of other things if you did.
— James Baldwin Esquire

money poverty

One can only face in others what one can face in oneself. - James Baldwin quote.
One can only face in others what one can face in oneself.
— James Baldwin

tolerance relationships

To act is to be committed, and to be committed is to be in danger. - James Baldwin quote.
To act is to be committed, and to be committed is to be in danger.
— James Baldwin The Fire Next Time

commitment

To accept one's past—one's history—is not the same thing as drowning in it; it is learning how to use it. - James Baldwin quote.
To accept one's past—one's history—is not the same thing as drowning in it; it is learning how to use it.
— James Baldwin The Fire Next Time

the past

The responsibility of a writer is to excavate the experience of the people who produced him. - James Baldwin quote.
The responsibility of a writer is to excavate the experience of the people who produced him.
— James Baldwin A Dialogue

writers

If you're afraid to die, you will not be able to live. - James Baldwin quote.
If you're afraid to die, you will not be able to live.
— James Baldwin

death

The questions which one asks oneself begin, at last, to illuminate the world, and become one's key to the experience of others. - James Baldwin quote.
The questions which one asks oneself begin, at last, to illuminate the world, and become one's key to the experience of others.
— James Baldwin Nobody Knows My Name

asking questions

Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced. - James Baldwin quote.
Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced.
— James Baldwin
The price one pays for pursuing any profession or calling is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side. - James Baldwin quote.
The price one pays for pursuing any profession or calling is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side.
— James Baldwin

career

People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them. - James Baldwin quote.
People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them.
— James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son

history

Rage can only with difficulty, and never entirely, be brought under the domination of the intelligence and is therefore not susceptible to any arguments whatever. - James Baldwin quote.
Rage can only with difficulty, and never entirely, be brought under the domination of the intelligence and is therefore not susceptible to any arguments whatever.
— James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son

rage

It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have. - James Baldwin quote.
It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.
— James Baldwin

justice ignorance

Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does.  Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up. - James Baldwin quote.
Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does.  Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.
— James Baldwin Nobody Knows My Name

love

Every legend, moreover, contains its residuum of truth, and the root function of language is to control the universe by describing it. - James Baldwin quote.
Every legend, moreover, contains its residuum of truth, and the root function of language is to control the universe by describing it.
— James Baldwin
Talent is insignificant.  I know a lot of talented ruins.  Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but, most of all, endurance. - James Baldwin quote.
Talent is insignificant.  I know a lot of talented ruins.  Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but, most of all, endurance.
— James Baldwin

talent

People who treat other people as less than human must not be surprised when the bread they have cast on the waters comes floating back to them, poisoned. - James Baldwin quote.
People who treat other people as less than human must not be surprised when the bread they have cast on the waters comes floating back to them, poisoned.
— James Baldwin The Price of the Ticket

the human condition

I imagine that one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, that they will be forced to deal with pain. - James Baldwin quote.
I imagine that one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, that they will be forced to deal with pain.
— James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son

hate

At the root of the American Negro problem is the necessity of the American White man to find a way of living with the Negro in order to be able to live with himself. - James Baldwin quote.
At the root of the American Negro problem is the necessity of the American White man to find a way of living with the Negro in order to be able to live with himself.
— James Baldwin Harper’s

African-Americans

It comes as a great shock around the age of 5, 6, or 7 to discover that the flag to which you have pledged allegiance, along with everybody else, has not pledged allegiance to you. - James Baldwin quote.
It comes as a great shock around the age of 5, 6, or 7 to discover that the flag to which you have pledged allegiance, along with everybody else, has not pledged allegiance to you.
— James Baldwin

African-Americans