“A strong woman who recklessly throws away her strength, she is worse than a weak woman who has never had any strength to throw away.”

“The woman who has sprung free has emotional mobility. She is able to move toward the things that are satisfying to her and away from those that are not. She is free, also, to succeed.”

“She hasn't your strength. She's never had any strength. She's never had anything but heart.”

“A strong man doesn't have to be dominant toward a woman. He doesn't match his strength against a woman weak with love for him. He matches it against the world.”

“If you meet a woman of whatever complexion who sails her life with strength and grace and assurance, talk to her! And what you will find is that there has been a suffering, that at some time she has left herself for hanging dead.”

“My mother was pregnant with me while she was in prison. She was her own attorney, never been to law school. She was facing 300 and something odd years. One black woman, pregnant, beat the case. That just goes to show you the strength of a black woman and the strength of the oppressed.”

“A woman's strength should not be in her role, whatever she chooses to be, but in the power to choose that role.”

“Are you the strongest of all men, so strong that you can be merciful to me, a weak woman? Here is the undoing of your strength: I am not a weak woman. I am not a little queen. And your mercy will be your undoing.”

“Marry an outdoors woman. That way, if you have to throw her out into the yard for the night, she can still survive.”

“Beautiful weakness! oh, if weak,
That woman's heart should tinge her cheek!
'Tis sad to change it for the strength
That heart and cheek must know at length.”