Toni Cade Bambara Quotes

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

He who wants to get to the source must swim against the current.

We have come too far, - struggled too long, - sacrificed too much and have too much left to do, - to allow that which we have achieved for the good of all to be swept away without a fight. And we have not forgotten how to fight.

I'll run against the grain till the day I drop?

...and we'll see what happens when we say Yes while this rigor mortis world screams No.

Though are hands are chained like they are, they haven't taken music from us yet. So that's how I'll fight. People tell me don't quit like everyone else. I wont have no fear.

You can’t go the distance with too much resistance

I say to myself if you believe deeply in your heart you must defy, and if you are willing to pay for your defiance, you must always do it, even though the pain may be much. Too many times in our lives we do not do it, and we pay even more.

It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks

To ask for power is forcing uphill a stone which after all rolls back again from the summit and seeks in headlong haste the levels of the plain.

All of you, wherever you are: in your spiny cities, or your one-bump towns. Find it, the hard stuff, the links of metal and chink, the fragments of stone filling your stomach. And pull, and pull, and pull. I will make a pact with you: I will do it if you will do it, always and forever. Take down the walls.

In a world that keeps on pushing me around, I'm gonna stand my ground, and I won't back down.

Walls don't fall without effort.

No one gets to their heaven without a fight...

I won't give up till we surrender!

And if I have to die trying, I will get out of here.

It will take a nation of millions to hold me back.

We fight to keep something alive rather than in the expectation that anything will triumph.

Resistance is greatest just before the finish line.

In that case I will devote my life to beating my head against that wall.

In the end you’ll see you won’t stop me.

As you go along your own road in life, you will, if you aim high enough, also meet resistance... But no matter how tough the opposition may seem, have courage still and persevere.

We're going to fight this battle with everything we have, and we will probably lose. But then we will fight it again, and we will lose a little less, for this battle will win us many supporters. And then we'll lose *again*. And *again*. And we will fight on. Because as hard as it is to win by fighting, it's impossible to win by doing nothing.

The only tired I was, was tired of giving in.

Don't surrender to the dying light; don't take it lying down.