Audre Lorde Quotes

Quotes about:

• It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.

  Audre Lorde

  Inspirational, Inspiring, Equality

  246 Copy quote
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  When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak.

  Audre Lorde

  Strong Women, Honesty, Silence

  Audre Lorde (1995). “The Black Unicorn: Poems”, p.25, W. W. Norton & Company

  212 Copy quote

• Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.

  Audre Lorde

  Caring, Compassion, Self

  Audre Lorde (2017). “A Burst of Light: And Other Essays”, p.130, Courier Dover Publications

  211 Copy quote

• There is no thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.

  Audre Lorde

  Struggle, Issues, Feminism

  214 Copy quote

• Tomorrow belongs to those of us who conceive of it as belonging to everyone; who lend the best of ourselves to it, and with joy.

  Audre Lorde

  Future, Joy, Tomorrow

  Audre Lorde (2017). “A Burst of Light: And Other Essays”, p.96, Courier Dover Publications

  158 Copy quote

• You cannot use someone else's fire. You can only use your own. And in order to do that, you must first be willing to believe that you have it.

  Audre Lorde

  Believe, Fire, Order

  13 Copy quote

• I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.

  Audre Lorde

  Feminist, Fearless, Different

  Audre Lorde (2012). “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”, p.132, Crossing Press

  177 Copy quote

• The true focus of revolutionary change is never merely the oppressive situations that we seek to escape, but that piece of the oppressor which is planted deep within each of us.

  Audre Lorde

  Focus, Pieces, Revolutionary

  69 Copy quote

• Black and Third World people are expected to educate white people as to our humanity. Women are expected to educate men. Lesbians and gay men are expected to educate the heterosexual world. The oppressors maintain their position and evade their responsibility for their own actions. There is a constant drain of energy which might be better used in redefining ourselves and devising realistic scenarios for altering the present and constructing the future.

  Audre Lorde

  Women, Responsibility, Gay

  Audre Lorde (2012). “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”, p.115, Crossing Press

  158 Copy quote

• When I dare to be powerful - to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.

  Audre Lorde

  Inspirational, Strength, Success

  "The Cancer Journals". Book by Audre Lorde, 1980.

  211 Copy quote

• We are all in the process of becoming.

  Audre Lorde

  Graduation, Becoming, Process

  21 Copy quote

• It is learning how to stand alone, unpopular and sometimes reviled, and how to make common cause with those other identified as outside the structures, in order to define and seek a world in which we can all flourish. It is learning how to take our differences and make the strengths. For the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house.

  Audre Lorde

  Order, Differences, House

  Audre Lorde (2012). “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”, p.112, Crossing Press

  157 Copy quote

• Without community, there is no liberation.

  Audre Lorde

  Change, Community, Collaboration

  Audre Lorde (2012). “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”, p.112, Crossing Press

  36 Copy quote

• Divide and conquer must become define and empower.

  Audre Lorde

  Empowering, Conquer, Divide And Conquer

  Audre Lorde (2012). “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”, p.112, Crossing Press

  116 Copy quote

• The speaking will get easier and easier. And you will find you have fallen in love with your own vision, which you may never have realized you had. And you will lose some friends and lovers, and realize you don't miss them. And new ones will find you and cherish you. And at last you'll know with surpassing certainty that only one thing is more frightening than speaking your truth. And that is not speaking.

  Audre Lorde

  Love You, Creativity, Missing

  181 Copy quote

• If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive.

  Audre Lorde

  Inspiring, Being Yourself, People

  178 Copy quote

• The learning process is something you can incite, literally incite, like a riot.

  Audre Lorde

  Process, Riot, Learning Process

  Audre Lorde (2012). “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”, p.98, Crossing Press

  25 Copy quote

• For we have built into all of us, old blueprints of expectation and response, old structures of oppression and these must be altered at the same time that we alter the living condition which are the result of those structures. For the master's tool will never dismantle the master's house.

  Audre Lorde

  Expectations, House, Tools

  61 Copy quote

• I want to live the rest of my life, however long or short, with as much sweetness as I can decently manage, loving all the people I love, and doing as much as I can of the work I still have to do.

  Audre Lorde

  Long, People, Want

  Audre Lorde (2017). “A Burst of Light: and Other Essays”, p.71, Courier Dover Publications

  20 Copy quote

• Sometimes we are blessed with being able to choose the time, and the arena, and the manner of our revolution, but more usually we must do battle where we are standing.

  Audre Lorde

  Blessed, Battle, Able

  Audre Lorde (2017). “A Burst of Light: And Other Essays”, p.119, Courier Dover Publications

  54 Copy quote

• I am my best work - a series of road maps, reports, recipes, doodles, and prayers from the front lines.

  Audre Lorde

  Inspirational, Prayer, Maps

  4 Copy quote

• I am on the cusp of change and the curve is shifting fast.

  Audre Lorde

  Change, Curves, Shifting

  Audre Lorde (2017). “A Burst of Light: And Other Essays”, p.120, Courier Dover Publications

  4 Copy quote

• Anger, used, does not destroy. Hatred does.

  Audre Lorde

  Hatred, Black History, Doe

  11 Copy quote

• You are the one that you are looking for.

  Audre Lorde

  Healing, Lourdes

  30 Copy quote

• To face the realities of our lives is not a reason for despair-despair is a tool of your enemies. Facing the realities of our lives gives us motivation for action. For you are not powerless... You know why the hard questions must be asked. It is not altruism, it is self-preservation-survival.

  Audre Lorde

  Motivation, Reality, Self

  78 Copy quote

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