Alice Walker

I prefer to praise people and the world rather than criticize them and it.

Howard Zinn was magical as a teacher. Witty, irreverent, and wise, he loved what he was teaching and clearly wanted his students to love it, also.

I start each book when it's ready and never before.

Part of my ancestry is Cherokee. And in that tradition, you become an adult when you're 52.

We must do everything in our power to cease the behaviour that makes children everywhere feel afraid.

We must begin seeing other creatures as equal. Existence makes us all equal.

I used to meditate all the time in bed. That was when I was raising my daughter, and I'd get her up and off to school, and then I would go back to bed and meditate. And then I would do the same in the evening, and that was very good for that period because I had so many things to juggle as a single mother.

For me, I used to be shy towards journalism because it wasn't poetry. And then I realized that the events that I covered in essays that became journalism were actually great because they inspired me, and they became my muse.

There's an ecstatic side to writing. It's like jazz. It just has a life.

You have to give others the opportunity to love who you love. If they don't accept it, it's their loss.

Some people are painters, and some are ballet dancers, and I'm a writer.

You bring children into the world. You love them with heart and soul.

My parents taught me service - not by saying, but by doing. That was my culture, the culture of my family.

What's really hard is that you could care a lot for someone and not want to live with him anymore.

Some writers sit down without a thought of what they are going to say, and they go through draft after draft.

It's very hard for our parents who see us enter a world that they can't imagine.

I've always felt quite singular, even as a child. That I must stay on track to keep my purpose.

Be nobody's darling; Be an outcast. Take the contradictions Of your life And wrap around You like a shawl, To parry stones To keep you warm.

Men make war to get attention. All killing is an expression of self-hate.

The world is changing. It is no longer a world just for boys and men

She thought of how precious it was to be able to know another person over many years. There was incomparable richness in it.