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I was born out of wedlock. Nobody brought me up.

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
Brought
Nobody
Born
Wedlock

More quotes by Ethel Waters

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There's no hypocrisy in Hell's Kitchen.
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Today I blame only certain agents for my long eclipse as a public entertainer.
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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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When you dominate other people's emotions, the time has to come when you will have to pay, and heavily, for that privilege.
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I had always loved John Ford's pictures. And I came to love him, too, but I was frightened to death working for him. He used the shock treatment while directing me.
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Asking what I considered an impossible salary when I didn't want to work for someone has boosted my pay again and again.
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Only those who are being burned know what fire is like.
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We miss a lot in life because we don't know when to quit, what to leave out.
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I dressed plain, but my partners were always spending more money on clothes than I could afford.
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All my life I've been prejudiced against wealthy people.
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If whites bored me, it was because they bored themselves. They seemed to get little fun out of life and were desperately lonely.
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There is a certain type of white Southerner who respects certain Negro individuals.
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There was one emotional outlet my people always had when they had the blues. That was singing.
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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 had been lots of crises in my life. And there was plenty of spunk and battle cry still left in me.
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There is a great supply of amateur undertakers in show business.
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Though I was a Catholic, I recognized that Protestant churches had something.
Ethel Waters
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My whole family could sing. My family harmonized without any instruments to accompany them.
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My father came back one day and forced my mother to submit to him. He raped her, holding a knife.
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I could always open shows, perform through the middle, and close shows.
Ethel Waters