Deaths From Disease

"The memory of all, even of the humblest whose record occupies no greater space in the world's history than the breadth of a small granite slab, wide enough to hold above the waving grass in any of the great cities of the dead the touching word, each letter of which suggests a tear— "Unknown," deserves to be held by their surviving comrades, by their fellow countrymen of to-day, and by endless generations yet to come, in tender, affectionate, everlasting remembrance."

"Sometime soon, some of you have to try walk across the divisions between you and join yourselves together to become the power you can be. Only then, whichever party or other group you belong to, can you work out your demands (not your requests) as young people, work out how you will make them happen, and make them happen."

"Her death was the loss of a dedicated anti-racist, a valued sister, and a friend we loved...Andaiye's anthology, published posthumously, is a great and unique gift to the movement."

"I'm always being accused of not feeling strongly enough about the location of the Black person. I don't know why you can't feel more than one thing at the same time, or why you can't see out of both your eyes. I perfectly well feel the location of the Black person. That doesn't stop me from seeing other people's location."

"One of the things that strikes me about now is that if you talk to Indo-Guyanese and Afro-Guyanese they can tell you the same story as two stories; and it's now crystallized even into what (television] stations we look at. Afro-Guyanese get their news from some stations, and Indo-Guyanese get their news from others. That first started for me in the 1960s: these two different stories from these two people living in the same place."

"I hated a lot of things about the Guyana in which I grew up, so I am not romanticising when I say that in spite of all that was wrong with it, it was as a child in that Guyana that I learned you could change your place. And one important reason was, that I grew up when men and women whom you came to know only as belonging to this party or that party, or this race or that race, joined together when they themselves were still young people in their twenties, to show that “ordinary” people could transform their world. That we didn’t have to be a colony. That people, poor and some not poor, women and men, from the races that were despised, could organise together and refuse to stay in their place."

"...this volume will occupy a vaunted place alongside the writings of C. L. R. James, Frantz Fanon, Aimé Césaire, Sylvia Wynter, Édouard Glissant, George Lamming, Kamau Brathwaite, Stuart Hall, and Walter Rodney"

"My strongest memory of both Ratoon and New World is the excitement of being part of a world of ideas, because, after all, my other world is one that has increasingly moved far away from the ferment and enthusiasm of the fifties to something that behaves as if there's no way out."

"For us, here, a key aspect of anti-austerity organizing we would need to take back up is the search for an alternative economic vision with people and nature at its center; and by putting people at the center I mean at the center of decision-making about economic development."

"Andaiye was the most important Caribbean woman intellectual-activist of the generation of Walter Rodney. Her subtle, loving and angry intelligence is rescued here, and with it the memory of the political struggles of the 1970s and 80s in which a critical feminism emerged from the ruins of the Black Power moment"

"if you want to talk about “empowering” any group of people, it is because you believe or know that something is taking power away from that group...For me, then, the first question is, what are the factors that stop young people in Guyana today from developing or using their power."

"in Andaiye’s departure we mourn Guyana’s conscience...Part of what Andaiye has done over the years is to point these political giants to a human and humane mode of conflict resolution, which has always been in their power and even at this stage lies in their power...In the tributes paid to Andaiye in the Guyana media were many regrets that she had not been suitably, or at all, recognised or honoured by governments. What has hurt the country is not the failure of governments serially to accord some spectacular honour to this wiry gift of the ancestors to our age. It is their failure as one commentator expressed it to attempt, to adopt her praxis. She not only stood forever with those of all races threatened with marginalisation. She set examples of a healthy and sincere respect for the Other of the spirit that can achieve the necessary reconciliation and of respect for difference and of cooperation across differences. She achieved the status of a global mentor of her time. May perpetual recognition attend her memory."

"We believe that it has been brought about by a special dispensation of Divine Providence, that the Frankish Princes should profess the orthodox faith; like the Roman Emperors, in order that they may help this city, whence it took its rise. Persuade them with all earnestness to keep from any friendship and alliance with our most unspeakable enemies, the Lombards."

"We must make sure that our country does not become one of those nations where the murder of candidates before elections is considered normal. Given the sacredness of life, the death of even one candidate during an election must be considered one too many."

"We came to recognise him as a gentle, caring and warm-hearted pastor. Through his gentleness, caring and warmth, he made an immediate impact on everyone who was privileged to make his acquaintance."

"We should not just depend on prayers but must also work hard to respond to the economic hardships the Country is facing. For prayer to yield results, it has to go with action. No matter how many times Zambians will cry and shout to God for help to improve the Country's economy, their prayers will yield nothing in the absence of hard work."

"Ecumenism is making progress in Turkey and we hope this will continue and grow. Communion among the different communities is increasing. We are all committed to dialogue and common prayer so we may offer the world around us witness of unity in Christ. Catholic religious in Turkey are keenly aware that they have a mission of ecumenical and interreligious dialogue if they wish to bear witness to the message of peace and harmony which Jesus Christ offers the world."

"His pastoral style was characterized by closeness and good-natured patience. He weaved relationships step by step, in the fabric of daily life, and always supported the occasions of common prayer with Christians of other Churches that I too have tried to promote in recent years here in Istanbul."

"To meet the challenges of the present day to bear witness faith to our Christian faith and hope, the international Fraternity of Friars Minor in Istanbul strives to build relations of ecumenical and interreligious dialogue with men and women of good will and believers of other religions and Churches . We know the journey is long with obstacles at every step but we are certain that dialogue is the path to brotherhood and peace, in keeping with the will of the God of life."

"Of course the mission is not without danger because terrorism strikes anywhere. But this makes it all the more urgent and important to work for dialogue in the spirit of Francis of Assisi."

"Building peace and brotherhood in the world and among believers is and will always be a daily task which we Christians wish to announce in the truth of the Risen Lord. Christ is truly Risen."

"If we can recognize that change and uncertainty are basic principles, we can greet the future and the transformation we are undergoing with the understanding that we do not know enough to be pessimistic."

"Most of our long-held beliefs about money, wealth, productivity and efficiency, and our notions of progress are rooted in immature, often infantile states of mind—easily manipulated by politicians and advertisers...Luckily, individuals learn faster than institutions and many people may already be ahead of their leaders.""

"Economics is really politics in disguise. We need to unpack the whole thing and say, 'Look, an economy is really nothing but a set of rules. Let's be up front about it. There's no actual science here.'"

"If you see a problem and don’t seek a solution, you have no right to complain,"

"It costs less than getting your hair done three times a year. And if you don't have the surgery, then you're asking to die."

"Prosthesis products are widely available in terms of being able to dress fashionably. I have one for swimming, one for strapless dresses, and regular bras for other wear."

"My entire breast was removed in a modified radical mastectomy, and I didn’t bother with reconstructive surgery,"

"This good pastor, ready to lay down his life for his flock, remained at his post, seeking after those whom the pest had attacked, and actuated solely by the desire of gaining souls to Heaven."

"Have you subversive, out of date, Or controversial ideas?"

"Ah, what avails the tenure race, Ah, what the Ph.D., When all departments have a place For nincompoops like thee?"

"You still whispered you would not die. Yet the nights I heard you cry Like a whipped child;"

"—Before we drained out one another’s force With lies, self-denial, unspoken regret And the sick eyes that blame; before the divorce And the treachery. Say it: before we met. Still, I put back your picture. Someday, in due course, I will find that it’s still there."

"Is it, then, your opinion Women are putty in your hands? Is this the face to launch upon A thousand one night stands?"

"The sleek, expensive girls I teach, Younger and pinker every year, Bloom gradually out of reach."

"I taught myself to name my name, To bark back, loosen love and crying; To ease my woman so she came, To ease an old man who was dying."

"After experience taught me that all the ordinary Surroundings of social life are futile and vain;"

"You must call up every strength you own And you can rip off the whole facial mask."

"Where, where is the long, flowing hair, The velvet suit, the broad bow tie; Where is the other-worldly air, Where the abstracted eye?"

"I haven't read one book about A book or memorized one plot. Or found a mind I did not doubt. I learned one date. And then forgot. And one by one the solid scholars Get the degrees, the jobs, the dollars."

"They wear their godhead lightly. They look out from their hill and say, To themselves, "We have nowhere to go but down; The great destination is to stay.""

"Riot in Algeria, in Cyprus, in Alabama; Aged in wrong, the empires are declining, And China gathers, soundlessly, like evidence. What shall I say to the young on such a morning?— Mind is the one salvation?—also grammar?— No; my little ones lean not toward revolt."

"I have not learned how often I Can win, can love, but choose to die."

"Though trees turn bare and girls turn wives, We shall afford our costly seasons; There is a gentleness survives That will outspeak and has its reasons. There is a loveliness exists, Preserves us, not for specialists."

"I happened to find Your picture. That picture. I stopped there cold, Like a man raking piles of dead leaves in his yard Who has turned up a severed hand."

"—All this Dark Age machinery On which we had tormented you To life."

"Ici, elle était vraiment fille; elle obéissait à son tempérament de femme ardente et cruelle; elle vivait, plus raffinée et plus sauvage, plus exécrable et plus exquise; elle réveillait plus énergiquement les sens en léthargie de l’homme, ensorcelait, domptait plus sûrement ses volontés, avec son charme de grande fleur vénérienne, poussée dans des couches sacrilèges, élevée dans des serres impies."

"It was the nature of the thing: No moon outlives its leaving night, No sun its day. And I went on Rich in the loss of all I sing To the threshold of waking light, To larksong and the live, gray dawn. So night by night, my life has gone."

"In darkness and in hedges I sang my sour tone and all my love was howling conspicuously alone."

"Up the reputable walks of old established trees They stalk, children of the nouveaux riches; chimes Of the tall Clock Tower drench their heads in blessing."