afro-art-chick: “I was unique in that I was a...

30th June 2012

Photoset reblogged from I Don't Bake with 567 notes

“I was unique in that I was a kind of black that white people could accept. I was their daydream. I had the worst kind of acceptance because it was never for how great I was or what I contributed. It was because of the way I looked.”

“My own people didn`t see me as a performer because they were busy trying to make a living and feed themselves. Until I got to café society in the `40s, I didn`t even have a black audience and then it was mixed. I was always battling the system to try to get to be with my people. Finally, I wouldn`t work for places that kept us out … it was a damn fight everywhere I was, every place I worked, in New York, in Hollywood, all over the world.”

“You have to be taught to be second class; you`re not born that way.”

“It`s not the load that breaks you down, it`s the way you carry it.”

“A little nepotism never hurt nobody, honey. If you got it, use it. Press on with it. Remind them of it.”

“I was lucky, as many of my generation was, in having a man like Dr. King in our lives. He came at a time that we needed to take a long look at each other and see how similar we were.”

“My identity is very clear to me now, I am a black woman.”

“Every color I can think of and nationality, we were all touched by Dr. King because he made us like each other and respect each other.”

“I don`t have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I`d become. I`m me, and I`m like nobody else.”

“Malcolm X made me very strong at a time I needed to understand what I was angry about. He had peace in his heart. He exerted a big influence on me.”

“Young people today would get a great deal of encouragement from knowing how close we could be if we had a man like Dr. King around.”

Happy 95th Birthday to singer, actress, civil rights activist and dancer, Lena Mary Calhoun Horne (b. June 30, 1917 – d. May 9, 2010)

Source: afro-art-chick

Crooked Purple Rain!