Wild, Beautiful, And Free Quotes
"A man falling down stairs was one of the saddest sights you could ever behold."
"Eyes that looked like they had been somewhere and had returned to find me and were asking, Would I help?"
"He tumbled and spun like a hay rake falling down the front stairs inside Fortitude Mansion."
"Air fled my chest, and a tingling sensation sprang up and down my spine."
"I know a bigger hell comes of keeping your mouth shut."
"Inside that man is every notion of what I know about myself."
"Because I do think of Papa. That’s what gives me pause."
"I was born of great love, and Papa bore me well in that love for as long as he could."
"Forever I could sense her need to set my hair afire."
"That was my first sense of infinity: an endless ocean of sugarcane flowing beneath me."
"He was the talk of the parish—Jean Bébinn and his nigger baby."
"Does your daddy treat you with love? Ain’t you treated like you matter?"
"Then you got something most slaves will never have. Whatcha gonna do with it, Jeannette?"
"You can’t know your mama’s mind. You can only know what you know."
"The land was alive to me in a different way now—no longer mere lines on paper on Papa’s desk."
"That rock comes from clear water, so your mind will be clear."
"Your papa’s always with you. Don’t forget that, Jeannette."
"He didn’t look like he was sleeping, as I’d heard people say of the dead. He looked shrunken, more like a shell, like something left behind."
"Our goodbye had happened then. But this body had held his spirit, and I was glad to see it well cared for and to know it would go in the ground of Catalpa."
"I thought she would spit in his face, and I wondered what I would do then, because I couldn’t let her disrespect Papa’s body."
"We were happy early on, I think. I loved how the air smelled of flowers and green things growing."
"But my baby died of the fever before he was a year old."
"But he wasn’t laughing or smiling because of me. He’d gotten himself enchanted by your nigger mama."
"You may be fair enough, but at the end of the day you’re just a little nigger girl."
"Madame, you are evil, and all your evil will roost in your bad heart and torment you."
"Papa’s soul is bound to this land, and so is mine, and so is Calista’s."
"If a thing was inside you like that, it had to be eating you up."
"Just stood to reason. I didn’t care enough about Madame, even in hate, to let her have that much of me."
"I’d find a way to avenge myself against her, and that would be that—at least that was my thinking."
"God don’t cause any of this craziness," she said. "He probably just as mad about it as you are."
"Just gonna be me. If I’m me, I can handle things just like I did that burn. They not gonna make me live like a rat."
"Who gon’ say so? Me? A court of law? Girl, I know you smarter than that."
"Silas had gone as far north as Virginia with Massa Holloway and didn’t shy away from talking about it."
"I might as well stay with Fanny and Aunt Nancy Lynne and Silas."
"Ran away? They didn’t miss her right away. I was working in the big house. Then they figured she would come back ’cause of me. She knew they’d whip me."
"What good would it do to be mad? I’d have to be mad every day."
"If you let all that being mad turn you into something else, that girl? She special."
"It’s what’s keeping me going now—thinking about how I can protect my baby and let him or her know they loved."
"Sounds like a man spending more time doing that than being mad."
"But you do know what he had to love. Just act like that for a while. See where it take you."
"You can’t know your mama’s mind," she said. "Only what you know—your daddy’s love."
"Don’t want you killing anyone. Hit a man in the leg if you can."
"Even if they don’t catch you, killing anything hurts your soul. Ain’t none of these white men worth you harming your soul."
"I just knew my heart had been aching for years, especially since Fanny had died, and I’d been sitting in that ache and stuck in it like a muddy swamp."
"It felt like God was saying to me, Time to get out of this muck, Jeannette. Here’s help to keep you going."
"Yes, baby, that would be fine," the new Lynne, who I figured was the mother of the two, told her. "Hush now."
"We’re all going to the same place, Philadelphia. It’ll be fine. Like Mr. Dillingham said, you’ll be just a day behind."
"I was with the people I was supposed to be with even though I wasn’t sure about where I was going—not just on a map but within myself."
"I thought of how much she might enjoy having a little shop like this of her own."
"I’m sorry, I don’t usually speak to men to whom I haven’t been properly introduced. Was my man causing a problem?"
"I wasn’t sure about where I was going—not just on a map but within myself."
"Because then I’d had a sense of something I had to do, of vital work coming up next."
"I find I can think in this cottage better than anywhere else. Maybe because it's not finished."
"She reminded me of my work and how much I enjoyed it."
"There must be some remedy to my discontent. I refused to believe such a remedy involved moving on to another position."
"My heart trembled at the thought because it seemed to foretell a restless life."
"I’m not hiding anything. I was born in the South, in Louisiana."
"I don’t concern myself with what I can’t change, sir. I know who I am. I know what I look like."
"It was just out there floating in the cold winter air."
"But you and I aren’t willing to be bowed by it! That must lend us some measure of superiority."
"When must one be accepting, and when must a man do everything in his power to break free?"
"I’m not sure about being superior. There is something wise, though, about accepting one’s lot in life."
"You have more places where you can be. You have money. You have land. And forgive me for saying so, but you’re a white man. This country is made for you because men like you made it."
"I don’t think, sir, it may depend on the consequences."
"I tried to say that we didn’t treat our slaves badly, but of course that was such a shallow argument. We were holding human beings in bondage."
"I knew life here would be different because of you, that you would bring goodness and light to this place."
"It hurts me to know that goodness could put your life at risk."
"This spring ain't gonna be like other springs. Can feel it deep in the bones of my soul."
"You are a schoolteacher. He is your employer. You have, as long as you do your job well, a right to his respect and kind treatment, nothing more."
"But to lose him on a battlefield? To think that he might no longer exist in the world? I could barely hold the thought."
"It’s all right. Lawd help me, I could have flapped my arms and flown here. That’s how happy I am that you’re alive."
"What is this life for if not to willingly give it up for those we love?"
"I’m not afraid to be alone, because it is what I have always been. I know how to be apart and solitary and still know that I am loved."
"My heart seemed to swell like a river blown out and overflowing after an abundance of long-awaited rain."
"You’ve given me a reason to fight, Jeannette. You’ve given me a reason to want to come back to Fortitude."
"But some part of me will miss calling you sir."
"It’s almost too big, too beautiful, to think about."
"Let’s celebrate today. Let’s go to Dayton and order a wedding dress for you."
"I am a human being, as are you. And I will stand here and demand respect on that account."
"Are you sure? Sure that this is what you want?"
"I think it’s the most beautiful miracle ever."
"One could say they were only a step or two above the fancy girls in whorehouses."
"There are laws. And you have no one else to protect you."
"By law, I might not have a choice about how I lived with Mr. Colchester."
"I refused to believe I had escaped that fate in Mississippi only to end up as Christian’s mistress now."
"You admitted I have been a good influence on him?"
"I don’t want to live that way, always being afraid of who might find out."
"Now that I know real freedom, I know that was nothing, nothing next to this. I’m my own man now."
"In that moment I was sitting with my friend Silas, and a sliver of moon still hung in the morning sky. It was enough."
"The musket barrage, thundering in the distance like kingdom come, began at daybreak."
"Times like this, I wished I had a place where I could see what was going on, like on a hill."
"The pace quickened as the sun rose high in the sky."
"But they don’t deserve to die out there alone."
"The thought of that sight multiplied a thousandfold was too much to bear."
"My heart broke. It wasn’t right—all this life, all this blood spilled out."
"With that reasoning, all our souls were broken, the living and the dead."
"Seemed like humans were killing humans so that humans could have the right to be humans."
"Was there enough forgiveness in the whole world?"
"Under the uniform his body was the same as all the other wounded. He a man, somebody’s baby. Like we all one."
"He talked about love. He talked about salvation."