Authors
Maya Angelou
1928 – 2014
Maya Angelou was an American poet and author best known for her memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. She overcame a difficult childhood and worked as San Francisco's first Black female streetcar conductor as a teenager before going on to become a celebrated writer, performer, and civil rights activist. In 1993 she read one of her poems at a U.S. presidential inauguration, a rare honor for a poet, and in 2011 she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor.
Quotes
“When someone shows you who they are, believe them.”
“Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud.”
“Develop enough courage so that you can stand up for yourself and then stand up for somebody else.”
“Without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently.”
“You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”
“Nothing can dim the light that shines from within.”
“Do not complain. Make every effort to change things you do not like.”
“We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.”
“Nothing will work unless you do.”
“You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.”
“Just like moons and like suns, With the certainty of tides, Just like hopes springing high, Still I’ll rise.”
“History, despite its wrenching pain Cannot be unlived, but if faced With courage, need not be lived again.”
“Alone, all alone Nobody, but nobody Can make it out here alone.”