I think that the inability to love is the central problem, because that inability masks a certain terror, and that terror is the terror of being touched. And if you can't be touched, you can't be changed. And if you… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
Love is like the lightning, and your maturity is signaled by the extent to which you can accept the dangers and the power and the beauty of love. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
One cannot deny the humanity of another without diminishing one's own. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
All I know about music is that not many people ever really hear it. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
I've always believed that you can think positive just as well as you can think negative. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
The white man discovered the Cross by way of the Bible, but the black man discovered the Bible by way of the Cross. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
The American ideal of sexuality appears to be rooted in the American ideal of masculinity. This idea has created cowboys and Indians, good guys… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
Voyagers discover that the world can never be larger than the person that is in the world; but it is impossible to foresee this,… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
We take our shape, it is true, within and against that cage of reality bequeathed us at our birth; and yet it is precisely… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
The American ideal is, after all, that everyone should be as much alike as possible. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
James Joyce is right about history being a nightmare-- but it may be that nightmare from which no one can awaken. People are trapped… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
I think Americans are terrified of feeling anything. I never met a people more infantile in my life. — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
Unless a writer is extremely old when he dies, in which case he has probably become a neglected institution, his death must always be… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
An identity is questioned only when it is menaced, as when the mighty begin to fall, or when the wretched begin to rise, or… — James A. Baldwin Copy Share Image
