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I have reason to be shy. I've been hurt plenty.

Ethel Waters

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Ethel Waters
Age: 80 †
Born: 1896
Born: October 31
Died: 1977
Died: September 1
Film Actor
Jazz Musician
Singer
Stage Actor
Vocalist
Chester
Pennsylvania
Shy
Plenty
Hurt
Reason

More quotes by Ethel Waters

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Basically there is no difference between whites and blacks, browns and yellows. I decided to think no more of people as Northerners and Southerners.
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The greatest acts in colored show business had long made Harlem their home and favorite stamping ground.
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Whenever I played Columbus, Ohio, I dropped in to see my close friend, a medium who had mysterious powers. Her Indian guide was Mohawk.
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There is a great supply of amateur undertakers in show business.
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Many people know how to criticize, but few know how to praise.
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After years in white theaters I dreaded working in colored houses. The noise, the stomping, whistling, and cheering that hadn't annoyed me when I was young was now something I dreaded.
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I want affection and tenderness desperately, but there's something in me that prevents me from handing it out.
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Only those who are being burned know what fire is like.
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You are a person of the greatest importance when you are a mother of the family.
Ethel Waters
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My father came back one day and forced my mother to submit to him. He raped her, holding a knife.
Ethel Waters
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There is a certain type of white Southerner who respects certain Negro individuals.
Ethel Waters
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I never posed as a saint. I would have slept with a man for nothing if I liked him well enough.
Ethel Waters
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My aunts lived on liquor and seldom felt like eating much. I don't know what's wrong about a kid stealing when he's hungry.
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My whole family could sing. My family harmonized without any instruments to accompany them.
Ethel Waters
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When I act I try to express the suffering or joy I've known during my lifetime.
Ethel Waters
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All my life I've been prejudiced against wealthy people.
Ethel Waters
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There had been lots of crises in my life. And there was plenty of spunk and battle cry still left in me.
Ethel Waters
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I wanted to be with the kind of people I'd grown up with, but you can't go back to them and be one of them again, no matter how hard you try.
Ethel Waters
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I never felt I belonged. I was always an outsider.
Ethel Waters
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I could always open shows, perform through the middle, and close shows.
Ethel Waters