Colson Whitehead Quotes

You are a New Yorker when what was there before is more real and solid than what is here now.

The city knows you better than any living person because it has seen you when you are alone.

Cora blamed the people who wrote it down. People always got things wrong, on purpose as much as by accident.

Nature is a strong brand name. Everybody knew that. First thing, Nomenclature 101. Slap Natural on the package, you were golden. Those words on the package promise ease from metropolitan care, modern worries. And out here, if you opened things up, underneath the cellophane, what did you find inside? That fruit has splendid packaging, it has solid consumer awareness and is an animal favorite. Its seeds will be deposited in spoor miles away and its market dominance will increase. Splendid and beautiful petals are great advertising--the insects buzz and hop from all points every weekend to hit this flower-bed mall. Natural selection was market forces. In business, in the woods: what is necessary to the world will last.

A slow hour passed, distracted by intermittent drops of moisture from above, as if the sky were conducting a feasibility study on the implications of rain. Of committing to a course of action.

They don't give gold bracelets for regrets.

The other patrollers were boys and men of bad character; the work attracted a type. In another country they would have been criminals, but this was America.

Men start off good and then the world makes them mean. The world is mean from the start and gets meaner every day. It uses you up until you only dream of death.