You Know I Am An Actor, And

In My Music, My Plays, My Films, I Want To Carry Always This Central Idea: To Be African.

Yes, I Heard My People Singing!-in The Glow Of Parlor Coal-stove And On Summer Porches Sweet With Lilac Air, From Choir Loft And Sunday Morning Pews-and My Soul Was Filled With Their Harmonies. Then, Too, I Heard These Songs In The Very Sermons Of My Father, For In The Negro's Speech There Is Much Of The Phrasing And Rhythms Of Folk-song. The Great, Soaring Gospels We Love Are Merely Sermons That Are Sung; And As We Thrill To Such Gifted Gospel Singers As Mahalia Jackson, We Hear The Rhythmic Eloquence Of Our Preachers, So Many Of Whom, Like My Father, Are Masters Of Poetic Speech.

If The United States And The United Nations Truly Want Peace And Security Let Them Fulfill The Hopes Of The Common People Everywhere - Let Them Work Together To Accomplish On A Worldwide Scale, Precisely The Kind Of Democratic Association Of Free People Which Characterizes The Soviet Union Today.

You Know I Am An Actor, And I Have Medals For Diction.

Like Any Other People, Like Fathers, Mothers, Sons And Daughters In Every Land, When The Issue Of Peace Or War Has Been Put Squarely To The American People, They Have Registered For Peace.