August Wilson Quotes

Black Mary: Leroy. And John. And Cujoe. And Sam. And Robert. One after the other they come and they go. You can't hold on to none of them. They slip right through your hands. They use you up and you can't hold them. They all the time taking till it's gone. They ain't tried to put nothing to it. They ain't got nothing in their hand. They ain't got nothing to add to it. They too busy taking. They taking 'cause they need. You can't blame them for that. They so full of their needs they can't see you. Now here you come. You don't even know what you need. All you see is a woman. You can't see nothing else. You can't think nothing else. That blinds you. (Black Mary turns to him. A new thought occurs to her.)Okay, Mr. Citizen. I'll come to your room tonight. But the morning got to come, Mr. Citizen. What you got then? You tell me tomorrow. You wake up and look at your hands and see what you got. Citizen: I got me. That's all there is. Black Mary: That ain't never gonna be enough.

~ August Wilson

I been with strangers all day and they treated me like family. I come in here to family and you treat me like a stranger.

~ August Wilson

Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing.

~ August Wilson

Please, Mr. Engineer let a man ride the linePlease, Mr. Engineer let a man ride the lineI ain't got no ticket please let me ride the blinds

~ August Wilson

You can't visit the sins of the father upon the child.

~ August Wilson

Don't you try and go through life worrying about if somebody like you or not. You best be making sure they doing right by you.

~ August Wilson

My early attempts writing plays, which are very poetic, did not use the language that I work in now. I didn't recognize the poetry in everyday language of black America. I thought I had to change it to create art.

~ August Wilson

Aunt Esther: You think you supposed to know everything. Life is a mystery. Don't you know life is a mystery? I see you still trying to figure it out. It ain't all for you to know. It's all an adventure. That's all life is. But you got to trust that adventure.

~ August Wilson

Sometimes you find bad luck and good luck in the same place.

~ August Wilson

Some people carry their luck with them and people got to find it.

~ August Wilson

You right! You one hundred percent right! I done spent the last seventeen years worrying about what you got. Now it’s your turn, see? I’ll tell you what to do. You grown . . . we don established that. You a man. Now, let’s see you act like one. Turn your behind around and walk out this yard. And when you get out there in the alley . . . you can forget about this house. See? Cause this is my house. You go on and be a man and get your own house. You can forget about this. You can forget about this. ‘Cause this is mine. You go on and get yours because I’m through with doing for you.

~ August Wilson

Jazz in itself is not struggling. That is, the music itself is not struggling... It's the attitude that's in trouble. My plays insist that we should not forget or toss away our history.

~ August Wilson

Once I started to value and respect my characters, I could really hear them. I just let them start talking.

~ August Wilson

I write for myself, and my goal is bringing that world and that experience of black Americans to life on the stage and giving it a space there.

~ August Wilson

The blues are important primarily because they contain the cultural expression and the cultural response to blacks in America and to the situation that they find themselves in. And contained in the blues is a philosophical system at work. And as part of the oral tradition, this is a way of passing along information.

~ August Wilson

I had always been fascinated with Napoleon because he was a self-made emperor; Victor Hugo said, 'Napoleon's will to power,' and it was the title of my paper. And I submitted it to my teacher, and he didn't think I had written it. And he wanted me to explain it to him.

~ August Wilson

All art is political in the sense that it serves someone's politics.

~ August Wilson

Like most people, I have this sort of love-hate relationship with Pittsburgh. This is my home, and at times I miss it and find it tremendously exciting, and other times I want to catch the first thing out that has wheels.

~ August Wilson