412 Quotes by Colson Whitehead

It had been a humdrum couple of days, reaffirming his belief in reincarnation: everything was so boring that this could not be the first time he’d experienced it.

Perhaps his life might have veered elsewhere if the US government had opened the country to colored advancement like they opened the army. But it was one thing to allow someone to kill for you and another to let him live next door.

Tennessee was cursed. Initially, she assigned the devastation of Tennessee, the blaze and the disease, to justice. The whites got what they deserved for enslaving her people, for massacring another race, for stealing the very land itself. Let them burn by flame or fever, let the destruction started here roll acre by acre until the dead have been avenged. But if people received their just portion of misfortune, what had she done to bring her troubles on herself?

Did you know that smiling politely burns up the same amount of calories as speaking your mind.

But we have all been branded even if you can’t see it, inside if not without.

A plantation was a plantation; one might think one’s misfortunes distinct, but the true horror lay in their universality.

Live every minute as if you are late for the last train.

When the work was done, and the day’s punishments, the night waited as an arena for their true loneliness and despair.

People wore different kinds of chains across their lifetimes, but it wasn’t hard to interpret rebellion, even when the rebels wore costumes to deny blame.