I Wonder as I Wander Quotes

“Books -where if people suffered, they suffered in beautiful language, not in monosyllables, as we did in Kansas”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey

“Even to an outsider like myself, not only in the theatre was such disunity evident, but in much else in government Spain. Alvarez del Vayo, Socialist Minister of Foreign Affairs, once asked, "Why is it Spain's people are so great, but her leaders so small?”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey

“Around the world-even in places where there is almost nothing, the rich, the beautiful, the talented, or the very clever can always get something; in fact, the best of whatever there is.”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey

“I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go. You might have to squeeze through a knothole, humble yourself, drink muddy tea from consumptive bowls or eat camel sausage, pass for Mexican, or take that last chance, but—well, if you really want to get there, that's the way it is. If you want to see the world, or eat steaks in fine restaurants with white tablecloths, write honest books, or get in to see your sweetheart, you do such things by taking a chance. Of course, a boom may fall and break your neck at any moment, your books may be barred from libraries, or the camel sausage may lead to a prescription of arsenic. It's a chance you take.”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey

“You know, our machine gun company was named after Frederick Douglass...Herndon suggested the name, and Milt made a speech on the connection between Negro rights at home and the fight here in Spain. He said, 'Yesterday, Etheopia, Czechoslovakia--today, Spain--tomorrow, maybe America. Fascism won't stop anywhere--until we stop it.”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey

“Of all the big cities in the world where I've been, the Muscovites seemed to be the politest of people to strangers. But perhaps that was because we were Negroes, and, at that time, with the Scottsboro case on world-wide trial in the papers everywhere and especially in Russia, folks went out of their way to show us courtesy. On a crowded bus, nine times out if ten, some Russian would say, 'Negrochanski tovarish--Negro comrade--take my seat!”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey

“What a difference a border makes: on one side of an invisible line, food; on the other side, none. On one side, peace. On the other side, war. On one side, quiet in the sunlight. On the other side the dangerous chee-eep, chee-eep, chee-eep, that was not birds, the BANG! of shells, the whine of sirens, and the bursting of bombs over crowded cities.”
― Langston Hughes, I Wonder as I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey