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Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes Quotes

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Famous Langston Hughes Quotes

“...Me, I do not want to go to no suburbans not even Brooklyn. But Joyce wants to integrate. She says America has got two cultures, which should not he divided as they now is, so let's leave Harlem." "Don't you agree that Joyce is right?" "White is right," said Simple, "so I have always heard. But I never did believe it. White folks do so much wrong! Not only do they mistreat me, but they mistreats themselves. Right now, all they got their minds on is shooting off rockets and sending up atom bombs and poisoning the air and fighting wars and Jim Crowing the universe." "Why do you say 'Jim Crowing the universe'?" "Because I have not heard tell of no Negro astronaughts nowhere in space yet. This is serious, because if one of them white Southerners gets to the moon first, COLORED NOT ADMITTED signs will go up all over heaven as sure as God made little green apples, and Dixiecrats will be asking the man in the moon, 'Do you want your daughter to marry a Nigra?' Meanwhile, the N.A.A.C.P. will have to go to the Supreme Court, as usual, to get an edict for Negroes to even set foot on the moon. By that time, Roy Wilkins will be too old to make the trip, and me, too." "But perhaps the Freedom Riders will go into orbit on their own," I said. "Or Harlem might vote Adam Powell into the Moon Congress.'' "One thing I know," said Simple, "is that Martin Luther King will pray himself up there. The moon must be a halfway stop on the way to Glory, and King will probably be arrested. I wonder if them Southerners will take police dogs to the moon?”

IntegrationAfrican AmericansBlacksSegregationRace RelationsSuburbsJim Crow
Book:The Return of Simple
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“We drove across the Red Square past Lenin's Mausoleum and the towers and domes of the Kremlin--and stopped a block away at the Grand Hotel. Our rooms were ready for us--clean and comfortable, with hot and cold water, homelike settees and deep roomy chairs. Courteous attendants were there, baths and elevator, a book shop and two restaurants. Everything that a hotel for white folks at home would have--except that, quite truthfully, there was no toilet paper. And no Jim Crow. Of course, we knew that one of the basic principles of the Soviet Union is the end of all racial distinctions. That's the main reason we had come to Moscow.”

RaceRacismCommunismSoviet UnionAfrican AmericansBlacksMoscowJim CrowUssrHotels
Book:Good Morning, Revolution: Uncollected Social Protest Writings
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“In the course of our conversation, I learned that there were many cities in Central Asia where dark men and women are in control of the government. And I thought about Mississippi where more than half of the population is Negro, but one never hears of a colored person in the government. In fact, in the state Negroes cannot even vote. And you will never meet them riding in the sleeping car.”

GovernmentRacismAsiaAfrican AmericansPoliticiansBlacksSegregationRace RelationsMississippiVoting Rights
Book:Good Morning, Revolution: Uncollected Social Protest Writings
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“I feels evil myself when I sees a white cop talking smart to a colored woman, like I did the other day. A middle-aged brownskin lady had run through a red light on Lenox Avenue by accident, and this cop were glaring at her as if she had committed some kind of major crime. He was asking her what did she think the streets was for, to use for a speedway--as if twenty miles an hour were speeding. So I says to the cop, 'Would you talk that way to your mama?' "He ignored me. And as good luck would have it, he did not know I had put him in the dozens. Bu that time quite a crowd had gathered around. When he saw all them black faces, he lowered his voice, in fact shut up altogether, and just wrote that old lady a ticket, since he did not see any colored cops nearby to call to protect him.”

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Book:The Return of Simple
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“You see this, don't you?" said Simple, showing me his N. A. A.C.P. card. "I have just joined the National Organization for the Association of Colored Folks and it is fine." "You mean the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People," I said. "Um-hum!" said Simple, "but they tell me it has white people in it, too." "That's right, it does." "I did not see none at the meeting where me and Joyce went this evening," said Simple. "No?" "No! There should have been some present because that fine colored speaker was getting white folks told—except that there was no white folks there to be told." "They just do not come to Negro neighborhoods to meetings," I said, "although they may belong. "Then we ought to hold some meetings downtown so that they can learn what this Negro problem is all about," said Simple. "It does not make sense to be always talking to ourselves....”

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Book:The Return of Simple
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“Once more The guns roar. Once more The call goes forth for men. Again The war begins. Again False slogans become a bore. Yet no one cries: Enough! No more! Like angry dogs the human race Loves the snarl upon its face. It loves to kill. The pessimist says It always will. That I do not believe. Some day The savage in us will wear away. Some day quite clearly Men will see How clean and happy life can be And how, Like flowers planted in the sun, We, too, can give forth blossoms, Shared by everyone.”

WarHappinessPoetryPeacePoemAngerSavagery
Book:Good Morning, Revolution: Uncollected Social Protest Writings
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“Humor is laughing at what you haven't got when you ought to have it ... what you wish in your secret heart were not funny, but it is, and you must laugh. Humor is your own unconscious therapy. Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air, and you.”

HeartMayEarthWishSecretLaughingAirHavensOughtSummerRainWelcomeTherapyUnconsciousSummer Rain
Book:The Collected Works of Langston Hughes: Essays on art, race, politics, and world affairs
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“This is the mountain standing in the way of any true Negro art in America - this urge within the race toward whiteness, the desire to pour racial individuality into the mold of American standardization, and to be as little Negro and as much American as possible.”

WayLittlesArtAmericaDesireRaceMountainStandingIndividualityUrgesMoldWhitenessStandardization
Book:The Collected Works of Langston Hughes: Essays on art, race, politics, and world affairs
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“Through my grandmother's stories always life moved, moved heroically toward an end. Nobody ever cried in my grandmother's stories. They worked, or schemed, or fought. But no crying. When my grandmother died, I didn't cry, either. Something about my grandmother's stories (without her ever having said so) taught me the uselessness of crying about anything."”

SaidEndsStoriesCryTaughtDiedMovedGrandmotherCriedMy GrandmotherUselessnessMother Died
Book:The Collected Works of Langston Hughes
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“Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby.”

WaterKissingBeatsRainSilverLiquidRainyRainy DayDrinking WaterRaindropsDrop Of WaterDrink WaterLullabyKissing HimWater ResourcesKissing YouKissing FunnyKissing And LoveWind And RainBest KissWater FountainRaining DayMonsoonsRainy WeatherInspirational RainRain And SnowLove RainRain WaterHappy RainSpring RainAcid RainRains BeautyThis LullabyRain DropI Love RainGentle Rain
Book:Sail Away
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“Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.”

IfsLoveInspirationalDreamLife IsPoetryDiesChangeFreedomBusinessKnowledgePositive ThinkingInspirational LifeBrokenBirdWingsEducationalAfrican AmericanNovelistsYour DreamsBroken HeartDreamerAmerican DreamFulfillingFollow Your DreamsBlack HistoryChase Your DreamsDreams Do Come TrueHopes And DreamsI Had A DreamDreams And RealityEssayistsJust A DreamDreams You HaveHold FastColumnistsBlack History MonthDare To DreamSmall DreamsDreams And GoalsBroken DreamsFollowing DreamsAchieving DreamsBlack History Month InspirationalLife DreamDream RealityFollowing My DreamsAfrican American HistoryAchieving Your DreamsInspirational DreamLife Is A DreamDreams And AspirationsHopes DreamsBlack History InspirationalLife And DreamsHarlem RenaissanceFulfilling DreamsAfrican American InspirationalDreaming About YouNever Stop DreamingBroken WingsBird FlyingCute DreamDreams And PassionHopes In LifeDream ChasingFulfilling Your Dreams
Author:Langston Hughes
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“Anyday, one can walk down the street in a big city and see a thousand people. Any photographer can photograph these people - but very few photographers can make their prints not only reproductions of the people taken, but a comment upon them - or more, a comment upon their lives - or more still, a comment upon the social order that creates these lives.”

PeopleStillsBigsOrderSocialWalksCitiesTakenStreetsThousandPhotographerPhotographPrintCommentReproductionSocial OrderBig Cities
Book:The Collected Works of Langston Hughes: Essays on art, race, politics, and world affairs
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