Paul Beatty

I can't say that I love writing, but I do love the satisfaction that it gives me.

— Paul Beatty

“Hadar, the only time I feel black is when I look at my hands," Spencer said, spreading his fingers out in front…

— Paul Beatty

“These are the women my father warned me about. The drug-and-asshole-addled women who sit in the dark, hard up and lovesick, chainsmoking…

— Paul Beatty

The anger and fear are so global. And of course, we live where we live and there's a hierarchy to who is…

— Paul Beatty

I think everybody focuses on race, but it's about a ton of things, and I just see these things as all interrelated…

— Paul Beatty

I'm not searching for the truth.That's too much pressure .

— Paul Beatty

“It's corny, but I think poems are echoes of the voices in your head and from your past. Your sisters, your father,…

— Paul Beatty

The thing is that it's always a constant reminder of how violent this country has been, always has been, you know. I'm…

— Paul Beatty

I've also never written anything really in LA.

— Paul Beatty

I've written a little bit in Germany.

— Paul Beatty

All this angst, all this stuff we all feel, is just tied to making art. It's so ancient.

— Paul Beatty

I'm not much of a self-promoter or anything. It's not something I feel comfortable doing. But sometimes I would get frustrated, I'd…

— Paul Beatty

I'm not very pious about anything, fortunately, but I'm skewering myself first. I'm skewering things that I care about and things that…

— Paul Beatty

“I missed my father driving us back from the Pomona State Fair, elbowing me awake, the Dodger postgame on the radio as…

— Paul Beatty

I talk about folding it in often with Althea, my girlfriend. She's getting her doctoral degree at Berkeley and she talks about…

— Paul Beatty

Maybe I'm just sensitive to that person who's on the outside.

— Paul Beatty

If all the world's a stage, I want to operate the trap door.

— Paul Beatty

It's so hard to say what you really mean. For any number of reasons: to protect yourself, or if you just can't…

— Paul Beatty

“I understand now that the only time black people don't feel guilty is when we've actually done something wrong, because that relieves…

— Paul Beatty

“Ms. Nomura, it's so big." "What is?" "The district. I'm mean, I got the park, the West Side, everything but the fancy…

— Paul Beatty

I try to be accommodating, but I'm pretty much a loner.

— Paul Beatty

“I stared in awe at the Lincoln Memorial. If Honest Abe had come to life and somehow managed to lift his bony…

— Paul Beatty

The other thing [my psychology professor] said to me was that I was always very mindful of the person who was away…

— Paul Beatty

“When she finished, the white teacher, his face streaked with tears, tapped his boss on the shoulder, and like a television cop…

— Paul Beatty

If I'm in LA, I'm close to home, and that just brings up all these other things, good and bad. There is…

— Paul Beatty