But At The End Of The Day,

You Know What Needs To Be Done When You're A Writer. You Know What The Job Is, Particularly If You're An African American Writer, Or If You Deal With People, Or If Your Subjects Are Poor People Or People Who Need Voice. So You Don't Really Need To Know Whether Or Not You Are Doing The Right Thing. What You Have To Be Wary Of If You're Doing The Right Thing To The Right Level That Will Surpass Your Own Life. I'm Hoping That My Work Will Surpass My Own Life.

My Whole Family Was - We Grew Up In New York, But All My Relatives And All My Father And Stepfather's Family, They Were All From The South. So I Like That Old Black Voice, And I Love The Sort Of Old Black Man With A Corncob Pipe, Sitting There Telling A Whopper.

If You're A Creative Person, You'd Better Not Read What People Write About You, Because If It's Good It'll Blow Your Head Up And It'll Force You Not To Take The Subway And You'll Start Taking Cabs, And You'd Better Stay Around People, And If It's Bad, It Just Hurts Your Feelings So Much It Discourages You.

If You're Going To Cheat And Take People's History And You're Not Writing The Bible, You Ain't Really So Great. But If You Try To Do It In A Way That Doesn't Hurt Too Many People, Then You Probably Can Get Out Of Bed In The Morning And Look At Yourself In The Mirror.

Family Is The Last And Greatest Discovery. It Is Our Last Miracle.