Rock n' roll, through Elvis, became a target of southern segregationists, who believed that race mixing led, inevitably, to miscegenation and that exposure to black culture promoted juvenile delinquency and sexual immorality

One important difference between Jackson's career and those of many others is that he was a child star who became an adult star – a very difficult transition to pull off.

Like my mother, I was always saying, 'I'll fix my life one day.' It became clear when I saw her die without fulfilling her dreams that my time was now or maybe never,

To this and other disasters, Romanians reacted (and still react) with glum jokes: Bucharest became Ceaushwitz, Ceaushima, Paranopolis; the dynasty that ruled them represented socialism in one family. But gallows themselves were less evident than gallows humor.

He had not applauded, he had remained seated, but he had looked at her steadily. From the depths of eternity he had looked at her and Rosalind became immortal. If I could believe him, she thought, if only I could believe him!

Holloway became a place of horror and torment. Sickening scenes of violence took place almost every hour of the day, as the doctors went from cell to cell performing their hideous office. …I shall never while I live forget the suffering I experienced during the days when those cries were ringing in my ears.

We were promised a better life in our home countries when we were told that privatized water and electricity would make things run more efficiently instead the quality remained almost the same and the price was increased until it became an unaffordable luxury

With Christianity, freedom and equality became the two basic concepts of Europe; they are themselves Europe.

After "Jammin' In New York", I went from a comedian who wrote his own material to a writer who performed his own material... I became socially conscious, and found I had something to say that wasn't too common.