Quotes from Alex Haley

It was the first time the name had ever been spoken as this child's name, for Omoro's people felt that each human being should be the first to know who he was.

I got a little tape recorder and laid it on my chest and kept describing the scene as I saw it. Just the opening scenes took about 45 minutes. I don't know how it's going to end, but I like it that way. If I knew how it ended, I'd lose interest in the story.

Playboy: Do you ever wonder how you have survived this long? Thompson: Yes. Nobody expected me to get much past 20. Least of all me. I just assume, "Well, I got through today, but tomorrow might be different." This is a very weird and twisted world; you can't afford to get careless; don't fuck around. You want to keep your affairs in order at all times.

I read aimlessly, until I learned to read selectively, with a purpose. - Malcom X

Mingo went toward his cabin, but turning at the door, he looked back at George. "Hear me, boy! You thinks you's sump'n special wid massa, but nothin' don't make no difference to mad, scared white folks! Don't you be no fool an' slip off nowhere till this blow over, you hear me? I mean don't!

Fend kiling dorong leh warrata ka iteh tee.

Praise be to Allah for one long lost from us whom Allah has returned.

Sleepless late that night, his mind still tumbling with conflicts, he recalled something Omoro had said once when Kunta had refused to let go of a choice mango after Lamin begged for a bite: "When you clench your fist, no one can put anything in your hand, nor can your hand pick up anything.

He said he wanted to present an alternative; that it might be easier for whites to accept Martin's proposals after hearing him (Malcolm X).

I believed he had no human weaknesses or faults, and that, therefore, he could make no mistakes and that he could do no wrong. There on a Holy World hilltop, I realized how very dangerous it is for people to hold any human being in such esteem, especially to consider anyone some sort of divinely guided and protected person.

The way to succeed is never quit. Thats it. But really be humble about it.

Either you deal with what is the reality, or you can be sure that the reality is going to deal with you.

The way to succeed is never quit. That's it. But really be humble about it. ... You start out lowly and humble and you carefully try to learn an accretion of little things that help you get there.

My parents were teachers and they went out of their way to see to it that I had books. We grew up in a home that was full of books. And so I learned to read. I loved to read.

You don't spend twenty years of your life in the service and not have a warm, nostalgic feeling left in you. It's a small service, and there's a lot of esprit de corps.

I think from what I personally know, I am really quite proud of most of the people I know who have 'made it,' who do things to help people.

To the best of my knowledge and of my effort, every lineage statement within 'Roots' is from either my African or American families' carefully preserved oral history, much of which I have been able conventionally to corroborate with documents.

Every time an old person dies, it's like a library burning down.

A word, for example, that is negative, pejorative, and has caused more pain and suffering is 'illegitimate.' But every person has a mother and father. It is another way we let society hurt others.

The problem is to find the time to write. That's why I go to sea. I couldn't be happier than when at sea.

Racism is taught in our society, it is not automatic. It is learned behavior toward persons with dissimilar physical characteristics.

I look at my books the way parents look at their children. The fact that one becomes more successful than the others doesn't make me love the less successful one any less.

Most of the people I've met who are black in other countries look up to the blacks in this country. Though they may talk differently, they are anxious to partake of this country simply because things in their country are not physically on par with what they are here.

We don't know: some little black boy or girl growing up in the inner city might grow up and cure cancer for all of us - if we let them do it.