I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go.
Langston HughesRead
Even the 'Negro' shows like 'Amos and Andy' and 'Beulah' are written largely by white writers - the better to preserve the stereotypes, I imagine.
Interpretation
The quote criticizes the portrayal of African Americans in media, suggesting that it reinforces harmful stereotypes.
Langston Hughes highlights the issue of representation in media, specifically how shows like 'Amos and Andy' and 'Beulah' are created by white writers. This fact suggests that these portrayals are not authentic but rather vehicles for perpetuating stereotypes about Black individuals, indicating a deeper commentary on race and identity in America.
In practice
In a speech about diversity in media, one might use this quote to illustrate the importance of authentic representation.
I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go.
My writing has been largely concerned with the depicting of Negro life in America.
I tire so of hearing people say, Let things take their course. Tomorrow is another day. I do not need my freedom when I'm dead. I cannot live on tomorrow's bread.
An artist must be free to choose what he does, certainly, but he must also never be afraid to do what he might choose.
The calm, Cool face of the river, Asked me for a kiss
The only way to get a thing done is to start to do it, then keep on doing it, and finally you'll finish it.
Society is just a structure with no soul. The soul is of the individual. One individual outweighs all societies. And, one individual's revolution outweighs all revolutions in the whole of history, because one man can become the womb for God to be reborn.
Whereas I think: I’m lying here in a haystack... The tiny space I occupy is so infinitesimal in comparison with the rest of space, which I don’t occupy and which has no relation to me. And the period of time in which I’m fated to live is so insignificant beside the eternity in which I haven’t existed and won’t exist... And yet in this atom, this mathematical point, blood is circulating, a brain is working, desiring something... What chaos! What a farce!
Civilizations can only be understood by those who are civilized.
While photographs may not lie, liars may photograph.
The sad truth is that man's real life consists of a complex of inexorable opposites - day and night, birth and death, happiness and misery, good and evil. We are not even sure that one will prevail against the other, that good will overcome evil, or joy defeat pain. Life is a battleground. It always has been and always will be; and if it were not so, existence would come to an end.
When Levin thought what he was and what he was living for, he could find no answer to the questions and was reduced to despair; but when he left off questioning himself about it, it seemed as though he knew both what he was and what he was living for, acting and living resolutely and without hesitation.
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