Run a hand through your hair, like the white boys do, even though the only thing that runs easily through your hair is Africa.
Junot DiazRead
Artists are not cheerleaders, and we're not the heads of tourism boards. We expose and discuss what is problematic, what is contradictory, what is hurtful and what is silenced in the culture we're in.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Artists reveal societal issues rather than simply promoting culture.
In this quote, Junot Diaz emphasizes the role of artists as critical observers and commentators on societal issues, rather than mere promoters of culture. He argues that the true function of art is to challenge, expose, and discuss the underlying problems and contradictions present in our society, rather than to merely celebrate it.
Themes
ArtSocietyCultureCritiqueExpression
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion on contemporary art, one could use this quote to highlight the importance of critical engagement in artistic practice.
More from Junot Diaz
All quotes βI can see myself watching him shave every morning. And at other time I see us in that house and see how one bright day (or a day like this, so cold your mind shifts every time the wind does) he will wake up and decide it's all wrong. I'm sorry, he'll say. I have to leave now.
Junot DiazRead
Migration gives a blank cheque to put anything you don't feel like addressing in the memory hold. No neighbours can go against the monster narrative of your family.
Junot DiazRead
We all dream dreams of unity, of purity; we all dream that there's an authoritative voice out there that will explain things, including ourselves.
Junot DiazRead
I think 90% of my ideas evaporate because I have a terrible memory and because I seem to be committed to not scribble anything down. As soon as I write it down, my mind rejects it.
Junot DiazRead
When I read Toni Morrison and Sandra Cisneros as a freshman at Rutgers, it all clicked - that writing was all I wanted to do. It became my calling.
Junot DiazRead
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I am often asked why I started to write poetry. The answer is that my motivation sprang from a visceral need to creatively articulate the experiences of the black youth of my generation, coming of age in a racist society.
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A short story is confined to one mood, to which everything in the story pertains. Characters, setting, time, events, are all subject to the mood. And you can try more ephemeral, more fleeting things in a story - you can work more by suggestion - than in a novel. Less is resolved, more is suggested, perhaps.
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I write about characters that interest me. And I don't think of my books as being forms of entertainment.
Jhumpa LahiriRead
When I'm home on a break, I lock myself in my room and play guitar. After two or three hours, I start getting into this total meditation. It's a feeling few people experience, and that's usually when I come up with weird stuff. It just flows. I can't force myself. I don't sit down and say I've got to practice.
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Good music is very close to primitive language.
Denis DiderotRead