Phyllisia Cathy Quotes

″‘Proud? Proud indeed!’ I recoiled from the venom of her attack. ‘It is a trick! This thing beauty they talk about. Believe me, it is a low trick put out by God self.’ Her face was flushed with anger. ‘He puts meaning into beauty, and reduces the meaning to nothing.‘”

“Calvin is my father. To myself I use his first name, as a sign of disrespect.”

“All of my self-pity turned into a need for revenge. But I held myself at Mother’s knees not to rush up and scratch at her pretty face.”

“My face was burned with shame. Sitting there and not answering was like begging. And why should I beg? I had done nothing to anybody.”

“Of course there were many children in this class that were untidy and whom I did not like. Some were tough. So tough that I was afraid of them. But at least they did not have to sit right across the aisle from me. Nor did they try to be friendly as Edith did - whenever she happened to come to school.”

“I was always pleased around Edith and her sisters. They all thought I was pretty, all except Ellen, the baby, and she thought I was ‘beautiful’.”

“Edith ignored my snub. She always ignored my snubs. Edith had made up her mind, from the first day I entered this class, that she would be my friend whether I wanted it or not.”

“I stared hard into the faces of grownups, searching for a look of pity, of concern, wishing just one person would ask me: ‘What happened little girl?’ Then I could explain to somebody, and they might tell me what I was doing wrong. Why nobody liked me.”

“You are a West Indian girl going to school in New York and you are proud.”