James McBride

When I was coming up, a lot of serious jazz players couldn't stand funk.

Atticus Finch is, you know, he was just his whole - the business of his modesty and his ability to see tomorrow and to try to buttress his knowledge of what was coming for his kids was something that I'll never - as a father I'm not able to do.

We're learning a tremendous amount of propaganda from television and the Internet.

I think only now am I at the age where I've forgiven the past enough to say, 'You know what? Slavery was there. Let's talk about it in ways that will help us face tomorrow.

When you're interviewing someone, even your mother - you have to sort of deal with you have to get some objective space from yourself and the person but you also have to find what's the best way to get the information from that person.

My goal is to be able to fill out one of those forms that asks 'Who are you?' and be able to just put 'Human being,' you know?

You can't live for literature. You can't live for the job.

My family is my career.

All of us want to be Superman when we grow up, fighting for truth and justice. That's part of what drives me as a writer.

When you glorify violence, then it comes back to bite you.

A band is not a democracy: It's show business.

Historical novels are hard to do for the general public for commercial writers like myself.