Ernest Gaines
Ernest Gaines
Ernest James Gainesis an African-American author whose works have been taught in college classrooms and translated into many languages, including French, Spanish, German, Russian and Chinese. Four of his works have been made into television movies...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth15 January 1933
CountryUnited States of America
boss children face feed grace grow job men pressure war white
Grace under pressure isn't just about bullfighters and men at war. It's about getting up every day to face a job or a white boss you don't like but have to face to feed your children so they'll grow up to be a better generation.
lying men thinking
I like the sound of people's voices, and I think what a man says can very well tell what he's thinking, whether he's lying or not.
school men years
And I thought to myself, What am I doing? Am I reaching them at all? They are acting exactly as the old men did earlier. They are fifty years younger, maybe more, but doing the same thing those old men did who never attended school a day in their lives. Is it just a vicious circle? Am I doing anything?
men waiting brave
We wait till now? Now, when we're old men, we get to be brave?
men people come-up
How do people come up with a date and a time to take life from another man? Who made them God?
men dying trying
I still don't even know if the sheriff will let me see him. And suppose he did; what then? What do I say to him? Do I know what a man is? Do I know how a man is supposed to die? I'm still trying to find out how a man should live. Am I supposed to tell someone how to die who has never lived?
struggle men african-american
There will always be men struggling...
religious believe men
I think I'm a very religious person. I think I believe in God as much as any man does. I don't only believe in God, I know there's God.
eye men may
The sharecropper may lower his eyes, but not because he's less of a man. That's just a condition of society that such things exist.
came country deal knew realized tried
In the beginning, I tried to be a more cosmopolitan writer, but I realized that I was a country boy, and I had to deal with things I knew about and where I came from.
writing past trying
All writers write about the past, and I try to make it come alive so you can see what happened.
new-york writing years
I suppose I started writing seriously at 16 years old. I thought I wrote a novel at 16 and sent it to New York! They sent it back because it wasn't novel.
home wanted
I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to say something about home.
fear mark
The mark of fear is not easily removed.