Aim Quote by Colson Whitehead

Of course I'm a black writer. I'm not just a black writer, but categories like black writer, woman writer and Latin American writer aren't…

— Toni Morrison

Writing about Africa by Africans has been part of my literary apprenticeship, standing alongside works by authors such as Joseph Conrad, Joyce Cary and…

— Giles Foden

“African-American writers with an independent vision are often consigned to obscurity. The white critics can only tolerate one black writer at a time, usually…

— Ishmael Reed

Americans think African writers will write about the exotic, about wildlife, poverty, maybe AIDS. They come to Africa and African books with certain expectations.

— Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

It infuriates me that the work of white American writers can be universal and lay claim to classic texts, while black and female authors…

— Jesmyn Ward

I don't think there is any such thing as a black writer or a white writer. Ultimately, there is someone whom one reads.

— Derek Walcott

Despite the obstacles of race and class, I was always taught that I could accomplish anything I set my mind to. African-American writers, for…

— Clarence Major

Being a Negro writer these days is a racket and I'm going to make the most of it while it lasts. About twice a…

— Wallace Thurman

I'm not against White writers writing about Blacks as long as they are as objective as say James McPherson writing about an Irish American…

— Ishmael Reed

Typically, there's this perspective among writers - and black writers: there's this idea that there is one person - and maybe beyond writers -…

— Ta-Nehisi Coates

Twenty years ago, when I started writing, I didn't define myself as an African-American writer. And then you write books and you're focused on…

— Colson Whitehead

“Throughout my life as I’ve sought to become a published writer of speculative fiction, my strongest detractors and discouragers have been other African Americans.…

— N.K. Jemisin