James Baldwin citations (163 citations, Page 6)

James Baldwin: 163 citations 0 J'aime

James Baldwin: Citations en anglais

“The betrayal of a belief is not the same thing as ceasing to believe. If this were not so there would be no moral standards in the world at all.”

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James Baldwin livre Notes of a Native Son

Stranger in the Village http://harpers.org/archive/1953/10/stranger-in-the-village/ Harper's Magazine (October 1953); republished in Notes of a Native Son http://books.google.com/books?id=B0N2AAAAMAAJ&q=%22The+betrayal+of+a+belief+is+not+the+same+thing+as+ceasing+to+believe+If+this+were+not+so+there+would+be+no+moral+standards+in+the+world+at+all%22&pg=PA171#v=onepage (1955)

“Christianity has operated with an unmitigated arrogance and cruelty — necessarily, since a religion ordinarily imposes on those who have discovered the true faith the spiritual duty of liberating the infidels.”

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James Baldwin

"Letter from a Region of My Mind" in The New Yorker (17 November 1962); republished as "Down at the Cross: Letter from a Region in My Mind" in The Fire Next Time (1963)

“If the word integration means anything, this is what it means: that we, with love, shall force our brothers to see themselves as they are, to cease fleeing from reality and begin to change it.”

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James Baldwin livre The Fire Next Time

The Fire Next Time http://books.google.com/books?id=0S9TgXJ-aD0C&q=%22If+the+word+integration+means+anything+this+is+what+it+means+that+we+with+love+shall+force+our+brothers+to+see+themselves+as+they+are+to+cease+fleeing+from+reality+and+begin%22&pg=PA21#v=onepage (1963)

“At the rate things are going here, all of Africa will be free before we can get a lousy cup of coffee.”

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James Baldwin

"A Negro Assays on the Negro Mood," The New York Times, 12 March 1961, published in book form as "East River, Downtown: Postscript to a Letter from Harlem" in Nobody Knows My Name: More Notes of a Native Son (1961)

“I conceive of God, in fact, as a means of liberation and not a means to control others.”

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James Baldwin

"In Search of a Majority" address delivered at Kalamazoo College (February 1960); republished in Nobody Knows My Name: More Notes of a Native Son (1961)

“When the South has trouble with its Negroes — when the Negroes refuse to remain in their "place" — it blames "outside agitators" and "Northern interference." When the nation has trouble with the Northern Negro, it blames the Kremlin.”

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James Baldwin

As quoted in "Trapped Inside James Baldwin" by Michael Anderson http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/29/reviews/980329.29anderst.html, a review of Baldwin's Collected Essays in The New York Times (29 March 1998)

“Most of us, no matter what we say, are walking in the dark, whistling in the dark. Nobody knows what is going to happen to him from one moment to the next, or how one will bear it. This is irreducible. And it's true of everybody. Now, it is true that the nature of society is to create, among its citizens, an illusion of safety; but it is also absolutely true that the safety is always necessarily an illusion. Artists are here to disturb the peace.”

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James Baldwin

"An interview with James Baldwin" (1961), in Conversations with James Baldwin, p. 21

“Words like "freedom," "justice," "democracy" are not common concepts; on the contrary, they are rare. People are not born knowing what these are. It takes enormous and, above all, individual effort to arrive at the respect for other people that these words imply.”

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James Baldwin

"The Crusade of Indignation," The Nation (New York, 7 July 1956), published in book form in The Price of the Ticket (1985)

“The celebrity never sees himself. I have some idea what I'm doing on that stage; above all, I have some idea what sustains me on that stage. But the celebrity is not exactly Jimmy, though he comes out of Jimmy and Jimmy nourishes that, too. I can see now, with hindsight, that I would've had to become a celebrity in order to survive. A boy like me with all his handicaps, real and fancied, could not have survived in obscurity. I can say that it would have had to happen this way, though I could not see it coming.”

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James Baldwin

Interview with Julius Lester, "James Baldwin: Reflections of a Maverick" in The New York Times (27 May 1984)

“Much has been written of love turning to hatred, of the heart growing cold with the death of love. It is a remarkable process. It is far more terrible than anything I have ever read about it, more terrible than anything I will ever be able to say.”

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James Baldwin livre Giovanni's Room

Pt. 2, Ch. 5 - p.139
Giovanni's Room (1956)

“He was silent for a long while. Then: 'You do, sometimes, remind me of the kind of man who is tempted to put himself in prison in order to avoid being hit by a car.'”

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James Baldwin livre Giovanni's Room

Pt. 2, Ch. 3 - p.104
Giovanni's Room (1956)

“Maybe everything bad that happens to you makes you weaker, and so you can stand less and less.”

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James Baldwin livre Giovanni's Room

Pt. 2, Ch. 3 - p.97
Giovanni's Room (1956)

“One must say Yes to life, and embrace it wherever it is found — and it is found in terrible places. … For nothing is fixed, forever and forever, it is not fixed; the earth is always shifting, the light is always changing, the sea does not cease to grind down rock. Generations do not cease to be born, and we are responsible to them because we are the only witnesses they have. The sea rises, the light fails, lovers cling to each other and children cling to us. The moment we cease to hold each other, the moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.”

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James Baldwin

From Nothing Personal, a collaboration with the photographer Richard Avedon (1964). Baldwin's text for the volume can be found " here https://scholarworks.umass.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1042&context=cibs".