Quotessence
Home / Authors / Terry Gross
Terry Gross

Terry Gross Quotes

Radio host

Filter quotes by topic

AllKnowsThinkingPeopleClintonIfsKidsKindWayDadPersonsChildrenFatherMotherSaidWantAdsBillsFirstsHouseRadio

Famous Terry Gross Quotes

“I'm first generation American, and my parents were both from Nigeria. And so I always say that I'm literally an African American. So my last name is Famuyiwa, it's different. And so that was a part of my experience from people not being able to pronounce it to not sort of having sort of a shared, common history with a lot of the kids that I was growing up with because my parents were from Africa.”

PeopleFirstsDifferentKidsAbleLastsNamesParentCommonGrowing UpGrowingGenerationsAfrican AmericanNigeria
Author:Terry Gross
Create image

“My parents were pretty open about a lot of things, especially my mom. And any kind of little crazy thing I was into, she was very supportive of. You know, whether it was BMX bike racing or being in the Boy Scouts or surfing or anything else, she always seemed to sort of support it. And I think it's because she was an immigrant and that idea of sort of having her kids be able to have access to their dreams and whatever they wanted to follow was very important to her.”

ThinkingKnowsKindLittlesImportantIdeasDreamKidsAbleWantedParentBoysSupportCrazyMomMy MomAccessImmigrantsRacingBikeSupportiveSurfingCrazy ThingsBoy ScoutBmx
Author:Terry Gross
Create image

“Dad mistook - for some reason unbeknownst to me - he mistook his family for a platoon of Marines. I mean, he - the exact same thing he brought to the disciplining of a squadron, a battalion, a platoon, he brought to the disciplining of his children. He ran the house - he had Saturday morning inspections for us, he had white-glove inspections for us as kids.”

MeanChildrenReasonKidsHouseWhiteMorningDadRanSaturdayMarineGlovesInspectionSaturday Morning
Author:Terry Gross
Create image

“The line changed my life 'cause I thought of some poor woman I hadn't even met walking around the United States or the world not knowing she's going to be beaten up by me and these kids, unborn, not knowing they were going to be born into the family of a child-beater just because I was. So it really did have a great effect on me.”

WorldChildrenStatesKidsCausesBornLinesPoorUnitedUnited StatesKnowingEffectsChangedWalkingMetsNot KnowingBeatenUnbornChanged My Life
Author:Terry Gross
Create image