Black Boy Quotes

Quote 1: "...the faint cool kiss of sensuality when dew came onto my cheeks and shins as I ran down the wet green garden paths in the early morning." Chapter 1, pg. 9

Quote 2: "I'm hungry now, but I won't live with you." Chapter 1, pg. 33

Quote 3: "I'm doing all I can," Chapter 1, pg. 36

Quote 4: "When you get through, kiss back there." Chapter 2, pg. 41

Quote 5: "white, red and black," but quickly tells him to hush, saying, "They'll call you a colored man when you grow up. Do you mind, Mr. Wright?" Chapter 2, pg. 49

Quote 6: "You can't eat a dead dog, can you?" Chapter 2, pg. 71

Quote 7: "If I kissed my elbow, I would turn into a girl." Chapter 2, pg. 72

Quote 8: "At the age of twelve, before I had had one full year of formal schooling, I had a conception of life that no experience would ever erase, a predilection for what was real that no argument could ever gainsay, a sense of the world that was mine and mine alone, a notion as to what life meant that no education could ever alter, a conviction that the meaning of living came only when one was struggling to wring a meaning out of meaningless suffering." Chapter 3, pg. 100

Quote 9: Since Richard is "no longer set apart for being sinful," his family leaves him alone. Chapter 5, pg. 123

Quote 10: "I said to myself, that boy just doesn't know what he's doing," the man tells him. Chapter 5, pg. 132

Quote 11: "The naked will of power seemed always to walk in the wake of a hymn." Chapter 5, pg. 136

Quote 12: her "humanity [triumphs] over her fear." Chapter 5, pg. 144

Quote 13: "You ought to know God through some church." Chapter 6, pg. 150

Quote 14: "even if that isn't right, it's not far wrong." Chapter 6, pg. 157

Quote 15: "I never saw a dog bite that could really hurt a nigger," Chapter 7, pg. 163

Quote 16: While in eighth grade, Richard writes "The Voodoo of Hell's Half-Acre," a story that "stemmed from pure feeling." Chapter 7, pg. 165

Quote 17: "the principal's speech is the better speech." Chapter 8, pg. 177

Quote 18: "That's what we do to niggers who don't pay their bills," one man tells Richard. Chapter 9, pg. 184

Quote 19: "Could she ever understand my life?" he wonders about Bess, doubtfully. Chapter 11, pg. 217

Quote 20: "My ass is tough and quarters is scarce." Chapter 12, pg. 229

Quote 21: "This was the culture from which i sprang. This was the terror from which I fled." Chapter 14, pg. 257

Quote 22: "Color hate defined the place of black life as below that of white life," he explains. Chapter 15, pg. 266

Quote 23: "Having been thrust out of the world because of my race, I had accepted my destiny by not being curious about what shaped it." Chapter 16, pg. 288

Quote 24: He finds that these people "believe in life." Chapter 18, pg. 320

Quote 25: "Trying to please everybody, I pleased nobody," he says ruefully. Chapter 18, pg. 324

Quote 26: "We must have a purge." Chapter 18, pg. 326

Quote 27: Richard is still convinced that he can win their trust eventually, because he cares about their fate so much, but he also "fear[s] their militant ignorance." Chapter 19, pg. 332

Quote 28: "You lost people!" he cries Chapter 19, pg. 337

Quote 29: Ross is charged with vague crimes like "anti-leadership tendencies." Chapter 19, pg. 340

Quote 30: He wonders if a black man "ever live like a halfway decent human being in this goddamn country." Chapter 19, pg. 349

Quote 31: One actor says, "I lived in the South and I never saw any chain gangs." Chapter 19, pg. 365

Quote 32: But the actors find out that Richard has been talking to him, and grow furious, calling him an "Uncle Tom," Chapter 19, pg. 366

Quote 33: they hate him for the "tone of [his] thoughts." Chapter 19, pg. 369

Quote 34: "[Last night] was horrible." Chapter 19, pg. 375

Quote 35: "Get out of our ranks!" Chapter 20, pg. 380

Quote 36: "I would send other words to tell, to march, to fight, to create a sense of the hunger of life that gnaws in us all, to keep alive in our hearts a sense of the inexpressibly human." Chapter 20, pg. 384