John Edgar Wideman Quotes

During the darkest periods in recent history, of course, the most subversive things you could do is think, read if you can get the material and remind yourself that love exists.

That's one of the beauties, I think, of African American life. There was this thing called slavery and adjustments were made. It literally destroyed millions, but it didn't destroy everybody and it didn't destroy the inner lives of all the people who experienced it.

You can see that in people around the world who struggle to survive with little or nothing. Whether they've been inspired by faith or by loving relationships, or whether it's just something innate that gives them that ability to shine and inspire others.

Eventually this all passes. The public horrors of today eventually blow away. And, yes, you are changed by the awful wake of reckoning they leave behind. Hopefully in the process you don't lose your ability to throw your arms in the air again and spin in wild abandon. That is the ultimate F.U. and - finally - the most beautiful survival tool of all. Don't let them take that away from you.

We shall live even in this state of living death, we shall love, we shall feel, we shall defy all who would judge and destroy us.

When bad things turn good, the reason can usually be found in the human heart—sometimes in the hearts of great masses of people, sometimes in the heart of a solitary soul.

People say, That which doesn't kill you makes you stronger. But they are wrong. What doesn't kill you doesn't kill you. That's all you get. Sometimes, you just have to hope that's enough.

The ups and downs, the problems and stress, along with all the happiness, have given me optimism and hope because I am living proof of survival.

"No," he says, taking us both in. "No, no, no. You've come farther than most people on this planet will in their lifetimes. You've overcome obstacles and dangers and things that should've killed you. You've outrun an army and a madman and deadly illness and seen things most people will never see. How do you think you could have possibly come this far if you didn't have hope?"

As long as hope remains and meaning is preserved, the possibility of overcoming oppression stays alive.

In terrible moments, in moments of revolution, of war or repression, of illness or death, people react with incredible strength.

The gains in education are never really lost. Books may be burned and cities sacked, but truth, like the yearning for freedom, lives in the hearts of humble men.

Through all the darkness, through all the shame of which men are capable, the spirit of man will remain alive on this earth. It may sleep, but it will awaken. It may wear chains, but it will break through.

To be a survivor as an African American man - maybe any man - you have to be pretty tough. Or at least that's what we all understand.

Why, Tom - us people will go on livin' when all them people is gone. Why, Tom, we're the people that live. They ain't gonna wipe us out. Why, we're the people - we go on.' 'We take a beatin' all the time.' 'I know.' Ma chuckled. 'Maybe that makes us tough. Rich fellas come up an' they die, an' their kids ain't no good, an' they die out. But, Tom, we keep a-comin'. Don' you fret none, Tom. A different time's comin'.

I should at least mention that I am also discovering a degree of strength and of basic ability for humans to remain human in the direst of circumstances – which I also haven’t seen before. I think the word is dignity. I wish you could meet these people. Maybe, hopefully, someday you will.

My people couldn't have survived slavery without having hope that it would get better. And there's some songs from the 19th and 18th century that say [sings], "By and by, by and by, I will lay down, this heavy load." And I mean, so many songs that spoke of hope and understand it better by and by. Amazing songs. So that the slaves, just knowing that he, she, did not have the right legally to walk within one inch away from where the slave owner dictated, and yet the same person, wrote and sang with fervor, "If the lord wants somebody, here am I, send me." It's amazing.

I AM VERY MOVED BY SURVIVORS. BY PEOPLE WHO KNOW HOW TO OVERCOME A HANDICAP, A SITUATION, OR ANYTHING. VISITING THE HEARTS AND SOULS OF THOSE PEOPLE TEACHES ME A LOT ABOUT HUMANS AND HUMANITY.

But what could you do? Only keep going. People kept going; they had been doing it for thousands of years. You took the kindness offered, letting it seep as far in as it could go, and the remaining dark crevices you carried around with you, knowing that over time they might change into something almost bearable.

My ability to survive personal crises is really a mark of the character of my people. Individually and collectively, we must react with a tenacity that allows us again and again to bounce back from adversity.

I'm a survivor - a living example of what people can go through and survive.

I believe very deeply in the human spirit, and I have a sense of awe about it. I look around and ask, 'What makes the difference? What is it?' I've known people the world has thrown everything at - to discourage them, to kill them, to break their spirit. And yet something about them retains a dignity. They face life and they don't ask quarters.

We draw our strength from the very despair in which we have been forced to live. We shall endure

Ultimately, we're incredibly resilient creatures. People really do get on with the business of living.

What I learned for myself... is that no matter what the circumstances, people survive.