I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings Quotes

In Stamps the segregation was so complete that most Black children didn't really, absolutely know what whites looked like.

I had read a Tale of Two Cities and found it up to my standards as a romantic novel. She opened the first page and I heard poetry for the first time in my life...her voice slid in and curved down trough and over the words. She was nearly singing.

Few, if any, survive their teens. Most surrender to the vague but murderous pressure of adult conformity.

My mother said I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy.

My mother said I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to school, were more educated and more intelligent than college professors.

She comprehended the perversity of life, that in the struggle lies the joy.

Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between.

Anything that works against you can also work for you once you understand the Principle of Reverse.

At fifteen life had taught me undeniably that surrender, in its place, was as honorable as resistance, especially if one had no choice.

Of all the needs (there are none imaginary) a lonely child has, the one that must be satisfied, if there is going to be hope and a hope of wholeness, is the unshaking need for an unshakable God. My pretty Black brother was my Kingdom Come.

But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core.

Ritie, don't worry 'cause you ain't pretty. Plenty pretty women I seen digging ditches or worse. You smart. I swear to God, I rather you have a good mind than a cute behind.

Most plain girls are virtuous because of the scarcity of opportunity to be otherwise.

The quality of strength lined with tenderness is an unbeatable combination, as are intelligence and necessity when unblunted by formal education.

The world had taken a deep breath and was having doubts about continuing to revolve.

If you're for the right thing, you do it without thinking.

The needs of a society determine its ethics.

Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with deeper meaning.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill, of things unknown, but longed for still, and his tune is heard on the distant hill, for the caged bird sings of freedom.

The intensity with which young people live demands that they "blank out" as often as possible.

If growing up is painful for the Southern Black girl, being aware of her displacement is the rust on the razor that threatens the throat. It is an unnecessary insult.

Without willing it, I had gone from being ignorant of being ignorant to being aware of being aware. And the worst part of my awareness was that I didn't know what I was aware of. I knew I knew very little, but I was certain that the things I had yet to learn wouldn't be taught to me at George Washington High School.

Until recently each generation found it more expedient to plead guilty to the charge of being young and ignorant, easier to take the punishment meted out by the older generation (which had itself confessed to the same crime short years before). The command to grow up at once was more bearable than the faceless horror of wavering purpose, which was youth.

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me, When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,- When he beats his bars and would be free; It is not a carol of joy or glee, But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core, But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings- I know why the caged bird sings!

The needs of a society determine its ethics, and in the Black American ghettos the hero is that man who is offered only the crumbs from his country's table but by ingenuity and courage is able to take for himself a Lucullan feast. Hence the janitor who lives in one room but sports a robin's-egg-blue Cadillac is not laughed at but admired, and the domestic who buys forty-dollar shoes is not criticized but is appreciated. We know that they have put to use their full mental and physical powers. Each single gain feeds into the gains of the body collective.

Children's talent to endure stems from their ignorance of alternatives.

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

Life is going to give you just what you put in it. Put your whole heart in everything you do, and pray, then you can wait.

I know why the caged bird sings.

I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, is attributed to God's will, but as human beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God descends the scale of responsibility at commensurate speed.