Sidney Poitier
I wouldn't change a single thing, because one change alters every moment that follows it.Collection: Change
I decided in my life that I would do nothing that did not reflect positively on my father's life.Collection: Fathers
To simply wake up every morning a better person than when I went to bed.Collection: Morning
I know how easy it is for one to stay well within moral, ethical, and legal bounds through the skillful use of words - and to thereby spin, sidestep, circumvent, or bend a truth completely out of shape. To that extent, we are all liars on numerous occasions.Collection: Legal
I learned to hear silence. That's the kind of life I lived: simple. I learned to see things in people around me, in my mom, dad, brothers and sisters.Collection: Mom
So I had to be careful. I recognized the responsibility that, whether I liked it or not, I had to accept whatever the obligation was. That was to behave in a manner, to carry myself in such a professional way, as if there ever is a reflection, it's a positive one.Collection: Positive
I had to satisfy the action fans, the romantic fans, the intellectual fans. It was a terrific burden.Collection: Romantic
My mother was the most amazing person. She taught me to be kind to other women. She believed in family. She was with my father from the first day they met. All that I am, she taught me.Collection: Amazing
History passes the final judgment.Collection: History
But my dad also was a remarkable man, a good person, a principled individual, a man of integrity.Collection: Dad
My father was a tomato farmer. There is the phrase that says he or she worked their fingers to the bone, well, that's my dad. And he was a very good man.Collection: Dad
My father was very big on marriage.Collection: Marriage
I always wanted to be someone better the next day than I was the day before.
So much of life, it seems to me, is determined by pure randomness.
The journey has been incredible from its beginning.
There is not racial or ethnic domination of hopelessness. It's everywhere.
Generally, I tend to despise human behavior rather than human creatures.
I am not a hugely religious person, but I believe that there is a oneness with everything. And because there is this oneness, it is possible that my mother is the principal reason for my life.
I was the only Black person on the set. It was unusual for me to be in a circumstance in which every move I made was tantamount to representation of 18 million people.
So it's been kind of a long road, but it was a good journey altogether.
I come from a great family. I've seen family life and I know how wonderful, how nurturing, and how wonderful it can be.
I'd seen my father. He was a poor man, and I watched him do astonishing things.
I had learned something of Miami from people who had visited there, so I knew what to expect.
If I'm remembered for having done a few good things, and if my presence here has sparked some good energies, that's plenty.
I never had an occasion to question color, therefore, I only saw myself as what I was... a human being.
I have always been a learner because I knew nothing.
I didn't run into racism until we moved to Nassau when I was ten and a half, but it was vastly different from the kind of horrendous oppression that black people in Miami were under when I moved there at 15. I found Florida an antihuman place.
But I always had the ability to say no. That's how I called my own shots.
I lived in a country where I couldn't live where I wanted to live. I lived in a country where I couldn't go where I wanted to eat. I lived in a country where I couldn't get a job, except for those put aside for people of my colour or caste.
We all suffer from the preoccupation that there exists... in the loved one, perfection.
I'll always be chasing you... Glory.
I was fortunate enough to have been raised to a certain point before I got into the race thing. I had other views of what a human is, so I was never able to see racism as the big question. Racism was horrendous, but there were other aspects to life.
A good deed here, a good deed there, a good thought here, a good comment there, all added up to my career in one way or another.
In my case, the body of work stands for itself... I think my work has been representative of me as a man.
The impact of the black audience is expressing itself. They look to films to be more expressive of their needs, their lives. Hollywood has gotten that message - finally.
I wanted to explore the values that are at work, underpinning my life.
Mine was an easy ride compared to Jackie Robinson's.
When I set out to become an actor, I had set myself a standard.
My father was a certain kind of man - I saw how he treated my mother and his family and how he treated strangers. And I vowed I would never make a film that would not reflect properly on my father's name.
My father was the quintessential husband and dad.
I'm going to quit writing.
I want my great-granddaughter to have a fairly good understanding of the world in which I lived for 81 years and also the world before I came into it - all the way back a hundred thousand years, to the beginning of our species.
I knew what it was to be uncomfortable in a movie theater watching unfolding on the screen images of myself - not me, but black people - that were uncomfortable.
I had chosen to use my work as a reflection of my values.
As a man, I've been representative of the values I hold dear. And the values I hold dear are carryovers from the lives of my parents.
So I'm OK with myself, with history, my work, who I am and who I was.
I wanted to look at them because I feel, internally, that I am an ordinary person who has had an extraordinary life.
My autobiography was simply the story of my life.
Jackie Robinson is a true legend.
To be compared to Jackie Robinson is an enormous compliment, but I don't think it's necessarily deserved.