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But let us say he was (guilty). Let us for a moment say he was (guilty). What justice would there be to take his life? Justice, gentlemen? Why, I would just as soon put a hog in the electric chair as this.

Ernest Gaines

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Ernest Gaines
Age: 86 †
Born: 1933
Born: January 15
Died: 2019
Died: November 5
Novelist
Teacher
University Teacher
Writer
Oscar
Louisiana
Ernest Gaines
Ernest James Gaines
Take
Electric
Would
Gentleman
Life
Guilty
Soon
Dying
Hog
Justice
Gentlemen
Moment
Chair
Moments
Chairs

More quotes by Ernest Gaines

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I want you to show them the difference between what they think you are and what you can be.
Ernest Gaines
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...my heart may have been in it but my soul was not.
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I believe that the writer should tell a story. I believe in plot. I believe in creating characters and suspense.
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The Six Golden Rules of Writing: Read, read, read, and write, write, write.
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Question everything. Every stripe, every star, every word spoken. Everything.
Ernest Gaines
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All writers write about the past, and I try to make it come alive so you can see what happened.
Ernest Gaines
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I think I'm a very religious person. I think I believe in God as much as any man does. I don't only believe in God, I know there's God.
Ernest Gaines
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I like the sound of people's voices, and I think what a man says can very well tell what he's thinking, whether he's lying or not.
Ernest Gaines
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In all my stories and novels, no one ever escapes Louisiana. Maybe that is because my soul never left Louisiana, although my body did go to California.
Ernest Gaines
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A myth is an old lie that people believe in. White people believe that they're better than anyone else on earth - and that's a myth.
Ernest Gaines
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I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to say something about home.
Ernest Gaines
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Now, about that mulatto teacher and me. There was no love there for each other. There was not even respect. We were enemies if anything. He hated me, and I knew it, and he knew I knew it. I didn't like him, but I needed him, needed him to tell me something that none of the others could or would.
Ernest Gaines
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What for? I said. What for, Tante Lou? He treated me the same way he treated her. He wants me to feel guilty, just as he wants her to feel guilty. Well, I'm not feeling guilty, Tante Lou. I didn't put him there. I do everything I know how to do to keep people like him from going there. He's not going to make me feel guilty.
Ernest Gaines
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I suppose I started writing seriously at 16 years old. I thought I wrote a novel at 16 and sent it to New York! They sent it back because it wasn't novel.
Ernest Gaines
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Only when the mind is free has the body a chance to be free. Yes, they must believe, they must believe. Because I know what it means to be a slave. I am a slave.
Ernest Gaines
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He told us that most of us would die violently, and those who did not would be brought down to the level of beasts.
Ernest Gaines
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Words mean nothing. Action is the only thing. Doing. That's the only thing.
Ernest Gaines
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Nietzsche said without music, life would be a mistake. To me, without books, life would be a mistake.
Ernest Gaines
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And I thought to myself, What am I doing? Am I reaching them at all? They are acting exactly as the old men did earlier. They are fifty years younger, maybe more, but doing the same thing those old men did who never attended school a day in their lives. Is it just a vicious circle? Am I doing anything?
Ernest Gaines
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I try to write something that would interest anybody and keep them turning the page. You must have a plot and good storyline.
Ernest Gaines