Lena Horne Quotes
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Malcolm X raised my consciousness about myself and my people and other people more than any person I know. I knew him before he became Malcolm X.
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Don't be afraid to feel as angry or as loving as you can, because when you feel nothing, it's just death.
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It's so nice to get flowers while you can still smell the fragrance.
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I don't have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I'd become. I'm me, and I'm like nobody else.
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The naked female body is treated so weirdly in society. It's like people are constantly begging to see it, but once they do, someone's a hoe.
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It's ill-becoming for an old broad to sing about how bad she wants it. But occasionally we do.
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I'm still learning, you know. At 80, I feel there is a lot I don't know.
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Count Basie isn't just a man, or even just a band. He's a way of life.
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You have to be taught to be second class; you're not born that way. But the slanting process is so subtle that you frequently don't realize how you're being slanted until very late in the game.
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I really do hate to sing.
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I had my schooling right there in the Cotton Club.
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My identity is very clear to me now, I am a black woman.
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I was lucky, as many of my generation was, in having a man like Dr. King in our lives. He came at a time that we needed to take a long look at each other and see how similar we were.
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I'm me, and I'm like nobody else.
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Always be smarter than the people who hire you.
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I remember the day tDr. King died. I wasn't angry at the beginning. It was like something very personal in my life had been touched and finished.
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I made a promise to myself to be kinder to other people.
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As much as I try, when I open my mouth, Lena comes out, And I get so mad.
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In my early days I was a sepia Hedy Lamarr. Now I'm black and a woman, singing my own way.
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I found out along the way that they like you a little imperfect.
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Malcolm X made me very strong at a time I needed to understand what I was angry about. He had peace in his heart. He exerted a big influence on me.
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A little nepotism never hurt nobody, honey. If you got it, use it. Press on with it. Remind them of it.
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I'm not alone, I'm free. I no longer have to be a credit, I don't have to be a symbol to anybody; I don't have to be a first to anybody.
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50 years old is like springtime to me.
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I learned from Ethel Waters, Duke Ellington, Adelaide Hall, the Nicholas Brothers, the whole thing, the whole schmear. [The Cotton Club] was a great place because it hired us, for one thing, at a time when it was really rough [for Black performers].
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After I got over the terrible pain of having something of mine taken from me, I began to think how bad everybody else must be feeling. It wasn't a nice time.
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I've seen so much. And I've heard so many great performers. There are performers now that couldn't work back in the days when I came along.
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Every color I can think of and nationality, we were all touched by Dr. King because he made us like each other and respect each other.
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I want to sing like Aretha Franklin. Before her I wanted the technical ability of Ella Fitzgerald.
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It's not the load that breaks you down, it's the way you carry it. Carry it by the comfortable handles of gratitude for what's positive and that it is not worse, rather than the uncomfortable edges of bitterness for the negatives and that it is not better.
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