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A bizarre sensation pervades a relationship of pretense. No truth seem...  
Achievement brings its own anticlimax.  
All great achievements require time.  
Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make readin...  
As far as I knew white women were never lonely, except in books. White...  
At fifteen life had taught me undeniably that surrender, in its place,...  
Bitterness is like cancer. It eats upon the host. But anger is like fi...  
Children's talent to endure stems from their ignorance of alternatives...  
Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without cour...  
Education helps one case cease being intimidated by strange situations...  
Effective action is always unjust.  
For Africa to me... is more than a glamorous fact. It is a historical ...  
How important it is for us to recognize and celebrate our heroes and s...  
I am overwhelmed by the grace and persistence of my people.  
I answer the heroic question "Death, where is they sting?" with "It is...  
I believe that every person is born with talent.  
I believe we are still so innocent. The species are still so innocent ...  
I find it interresting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, i...  
I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels. Li...  
If one is lucky, a solitary fantasy can totally transform one million ...  
If we lose love and self respect for each other, this is how we finall...  
If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change...   Change
If you find it in your heart to care for somebody else, you will have ...  
If you have only one smile in you, give it to the people you love. Don...  
It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversit...  
Life loves the liver of it.  
Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told: ''I'm with you kid. Let'...  
Most plain girls are virtuous because of the scarcity of opportunity t...  
Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes an...   Music
My great hope is to laugh as much as I cry; to get my work done and tr...  
My life has been one great big joke, a dance that's walked a song that...  
My mother said I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understand...  
Nature has no mercy at all. Nature says, "I'm going to snow. If you ha...  
Nothing will work unless you do.  
Of all the needs (there are none imaginary) a lonely child has, the on...  
One isn't necessarily born with courage, but one is born with potentia...  
Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all p...  
Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and...  
Self-pity in its early stages is as snug as a feather mattress. Only w...  
Since time is the one immaterial object which we cannot influence - ne...  
Some critics will write 'Maya Angelou is a natural writer' - which is ...  
Something made greater by ourselves and in turn that makes us greater.  
The fact that the adult American Negro female emerges a formidable cha...  
The need for change bulldozed road down the center of my mind.  
The quality of strength lined with tenderness is an unbeatable combina...  
The sadness of the women's movement is that they don't allow the neces...  
There is a very fine line between loving life and being greedy for it.  
There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.  
There is nothing so pitiful as a young cynic because he has gone from ...  
There's a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscu...  
We all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry, and we mu...  
We allow our ignorance to prevail upon us and make us think we can sur...  
We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.  
While I know myself as a creation of God, I am also obligated to reali...  
Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voi...