Debra Granik Quotes

Too much is made for us; too much is given to us - even those of us who are underprivileged. The poverty is given to us. The difficulties are given to us.

I wanted to raise the voice of a lot of the people that I knew growing up, and this was, for the most part, poor people who had extraordinary dreams but also very amazing obstacles.

I've always wanted to write about the other side of the tracks, the have-nots, maybe because that's who I was.

My father was a civil servant in northern India where I was born. As a boy I saw the dire effects of poverty and illiteracy, especially on women and children. It often seemed that the only thing separating me from them was luck.

Whenever we have sought real progress through affirmative action, the spokespersons of the advantaged have not hesitated to cry foul ….

It's a strange world. Some people get rich and others eat shit and die.

There is despair, Mr President, in the faces of those you do not see; in the places that you do not visit.

It is definitely true that adversity and hardship are not evenly distributed.

It's kind of almost not fair that certain people don't get the opportunities that others get just because of where they are born or where they were brought up.

I think people really need to think what it's like to have all of society arrayed against you.

I don't come from a privileged background.

I can hardly express in words my deep feeling and sympathy for them, knowing as I do, the many serious handicaps and obstacles that will confront them in almost every walk of life.

Sometimes I think the playing field is certainly not even. You know, it's just not.

I usually play disenfranchised youth.

I never came into life with any favours or privileges.

I was a child of privilege and I woke up to a world on fire.

I've spent my career trying to help people without connections understand what's going on so that they have a chance of getting a fair shake from the connected and the powerful.

Discrimination has a lot of layers that make it tough for minorities to get a leg up.

The disenfranchised should be going to art school - not the franchised.

There are people in whole parts of our cities who are being totally left behind and disregarded. They are unheard. They are told they are unneeded by this economy. And that extreme poverty breeds conditions for extreme violence.

It was simple reality - most competitive tennis players in my day were privileged, spoiled, entitled and white. Also, many of them were beautiful, fit, tan and of good stock - great big hair and white teeth and long legs. Then there were the rest of us.

The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right.

The prosperous can not easily form a right idea of misery.

I want nothing to do with privilege.

I have this soft spot for have-nots. So, I was really inclined to portray their pain and pathos in 'Highway.'