A platitude is simply a truth repeated till people get tired of hearing it.
James Baldwin
Experience that destroys innocents also leads one back to it.
James Baldwin
The primary distinction of the artist is that he must actively cultivate that state which most men, necessarily, must avoid: the state of being alone.
James Baldwin
When the book comes out it may hurt you -- but in order for me to do it, it had to hurt me first. I can only tell you about yourself as much as I can face about myself.
James Baldwin
Americans, unhappily, have the most remarkable ability to alchemize all bitter truths into an innocuous but piquant confection and to transform their moral contradictions, or public discussion of such contradictions, into a proud decoration, such as are given for heroism on the battle field.
James Baldwin
Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.
James Baldwin
Love Quotes
Any honest examination of the national life proves how far we are from the standard of human freedom with which we began. The recovery of this standard demands of everyone who loves this country a hard look at himself, for the greatest achievements must begin somewhere, and they always begin with the person. If we are not capable of this examination, we may yet become one of the most distinguished and monumental failures in the history of nations.
James Baldwin
The price one pays for pursuing any profession, or calling, is an immediate knowledge of its ugly side.
James Baldwin
When one begins to live by habit and by quotation, one has begun to stop living.
James Baldwin
The question of sexual dominance can exist only in the nightmare of that soul which has armed itself, totally, against the possibility of the changing motion of conquest and surrender, which is love.
James Baldwin
Love Quotes
It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.