Quotations

"Someday every woman will have orgasms – like every family has color TV – and we can all get on with the business of life."

— Erica Jong, American author, born 1942

"I don't know what the definition of pornography is and nobody else does either. Pornography is somebody else's erotica that you don't like. People are interested in their own sexuality and they've always reflected it in their art. End of story."

— Erica Jong, American author, born 1942

"Solitude is un-American."

— Erica Jong, American author, born 1942

"The soul is awakened through service."

— Erica Jong, American author, born 1942

"If, every day, I dare to remember that I am here, that this house, this hillside, these minutes, are all leased to me, not given, I will never despair. Despair is for those who expect to live forever. I no longer do."

— Erica Jong, American author, born 1942

"On stage I make love to twenty five thousand people; and then I go home alone."

— Janis Joplin, American singer, born 1943

"Audiences like their blues singers to be miserable."

— Janis Joplin, American singer, born 1943

"I am a stranger, learning to love the strangers around me."

— June Jordan, Caribbean-American writer, born 1936

"Our earth is round, and, among other things, that means that you and I can hold completely different points of view and both be right. The difference of our positions will show stars in your window I cannot even imagine. Your sky may burn with light, while mine, at the same moment, spreads beautiful to darkness. Still we must choose how we separately corner the circling universe of our experience. Once chosen, our cornering will determine the message of any star and darkness we encounter."

— June Jordan, Caribbean-American writer, born 1936

"To tell the truth is to become beautiful, to begin to love yourself, value yourself. And that's political, in its most profound way."

— June Jordan, Caribbean-American writer, born 1936

"If you are free, you are not predictable and you are not controllable."

— June Jordan, Caribbean-American writer, born 1936

"I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot…and missed. And I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

— Michael Jordan, American basketball player, born 1963

"Tell me I can no longer fly—I want you to."

— Michael Jordan, American basketball player, born 1963

"When poets die, other poets take it personally, almost as an affront. A lot of us "left behind" are thinking that poetry is the one thing keeping us alive and present, so what does it mean when one of our ranks chooses to end his or her life? There's an anger beneath the grief, you know? That anger and grief, in turn, breeds other poems from those of us left behind."

— Allison Joseph, American poet, born 1967