Alice Walker

Lasting love and forgiveness are two sides of the same page.

Usually I’m on top to keep the guy from escaping.

I wasn’t looking to be gay. I was quite upset when I discovered that was part of my life. I wished it would go away. But you can’t change who you are. And I tried to fight it in the beginning. And then I had a cancer scare in the mid-70’s. And that turned out to be a mistake, and I thought, ‘Life is too short.’

She was not for everyone, but she was for me.

I think when you get married, it’s not a totally free ride – it’s not without its unglamorous periods and its fights and its angry noons and silent dawns or vice-versa.

A lover cannot be chosen a la smorgasbord. A lover has to be chosen from soul-craving. To choose just because something mouthwatering stands before you will never satisfy the hunger of the soul-self. And that is what the intuition is for; it is the direct messenger of the soul.

I never felt I was too protective. I felt I was functioning as a dam against the river of sh*t that comes pouring down on artists, and it was a job that I took very seriously.

Don’t base a relationship on sex. You need love, compassion and caring. Then sex can be a reflection of that.

One of the reasons why I think that me and Kim are very powerful together isn’t just the concept of celebrity or this mega rap star and this mega-beautiful pop star. It’s something I explain to my girl: She is who she is. I am who I am. We have advisers and friends and everything, but those people are who they are and we are who we are. And what I had to learn from Kim is how to take more of her advice and less of other people’s advice. There’s a lot of Kim K skills that were added. In order to win at life, you need some Kim K skills, period.

You can repeat the mistakes of your parents’ marriage or you can go out of your way not to repeat them.

I have a rule, and that is to never look at somebody’s face while we’re having sex; because, number one, what if I know the guy?

Women prefer men who have something tender about them – especially the legal kind.

Each man takes care that his neighbor shall not cheat him. But a day comes when he begins to care that he does not cheat his neighbor. Then all goes well — he has changed his market-cart into a chariot of the sun.

Cherish your human connections – your relationships with friends and family.

True friends stab you in the front.