I remember going to see Amiri Baraka. It wasn't actually too long before he died. He said, "You've got to write to change the world!" I was like, "Not me, no, no, no, no." — Paul Beatty Copy Share Image
There are things I don't like, like sitting at the head of the class. It makes me uncomfortable. I'll do it in a seminar… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
In The Sellout I tried to capture how we can talk and see race, how we see urbanity, and how we see our history. — Paul Beatty Copy Share
In White Boy Shuffle, I combined my seventh-grade teacher, Mr. Takemoto, who really saved me - I don't think I've ever told anyone this… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
I co-taught a seminar called Small Group Processes with my professor. I learned so much from it, so much about myself, about groups, how… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
I'll say this, and it'll sound like bullshit, but it's not: I don't really pay attention to this stuff [Man Booker Prize] very much.… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
“Hereos. Idols. They're never who you think they are. Shorter. Nastier. Smellier. And when you finally meet them, there's something that makes you want… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
There are many similarities between Germans and blacks. The nouns themselves are loaded with so much historical baggage it's impossible for anyone to be… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
Like when you have the right title for something you're writing and you get lost - you can always go back to the title… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
I had a student once come up to me and we were talking about this incident, and, of course, I never had the right… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
There are always so many things happening [to us] at one time. We read Isherwood's A Single Man in class, and we had to… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
I forget how beautiful and calm California is. It's not so much about the place, but also the age that I came to the… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
“My litmus test of compatibility is 'Tom Cruise.' I hate people who hate Tom Cruise, cultural automatons who at the mention of his name… — Paul Beatty Copy Share
I think there's nothing new going on. Except that, you're even more public than you've ever been.There's some good and some bad to that. — Paul Beatty Copy Share
“Would he read the paper and see that the Union he saved was now a dysfunctional plutocracy,” — Paul Beatty Copy Share
