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

Book by Langston Hughes · 15 quotes · Laughing, People, Poet

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The Collected Works of Langston Hughes: Essays on art, race, politics, and world affairs Quotes

“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.”

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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
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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.”

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“We younger Negro artists who create now intend to express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame. If white people are pleased, we are glad. If they are not, it doesn't matter. We know we are beautiful. And ugly too. The tom-tom cries and the tom-tom laughs. If colored people are pleased, we are glad. If they are not, it doesn't matter either. We build our temples for tomorrow, strong as we know how, and we stand on top of the mountain, free within ourselves.”

PeopleIfsKnowsSelfMatterBeautifulArtistIndividualStrongJusticeDarkWhiteLaughingKnow HowCryTomorrowMountainShameSocial JusticeUglyGladTemplesTomsDark Skinned
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“But there are certain very practical things American Negro writers can do. And must do. There's a song that says, "the time ain't long." That song is right. Something has got to change in America-and change soon. We must help that change to come.”

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