I'm writing out of desperation. I felt compelled to write to make sense of it to myself - so I don't end up saying peculiar things like 'I'm black and I'm proud.' I write so I don't end up as… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share Image
I'm always telling my students go to law school or become a doctor, do something, and then write. First of all you should have… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
The slave trade was globalism. Why people insist that globalism, after its hideous history, is a good thing, I do not know. — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
I have no credentials. I have no money. I literally come from a poor place. I was a servant. I dropped out of college.… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
In my writing I'm trying to explore the violations people commit upon each other. And the important thing isn't whether I'm angry. The more… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
"Race." I really can't understand it as anything other than something people say. The people who have said that you and I are both… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
Race as a subject only comes about because of what I look like. If I say something truthfully, people say "Oh, she's so angry."… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
in the place I am from ... a grave is topped off with a huge mound of loose earth - carelessly, as if piled… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
I like melancholy. I like to pretend that I'm alone in the world and I'm just sort of abandoned. — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
I come from the small island of Antigua and I always wanted to write; I just didn't know that it was possible. — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
“Have you ever wondered to yourself why it is that all people like me seem to have learned from you is how to imprison… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
Love and hatred don't take turns; they exist side by side at the same time. And one's duty, one's obligation every day, is to… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
“Do you see the queer thing about people like me? Sometimes we hold your retribution.” — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
I didn't really understand racism because I grew up in an all-black society, so I didn't see how it was possible not to like… — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
A great piece of literature encompasses all that is and all that will be. — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
The people who invented race, who grouped us together as "black," were inventing and categorizing their ability to do something vicious and wrong. — Jamaica Kincaid Copy Share
