Thursday Thirteen #65: Richard Pryor Quotes

Thirteen Quotes by Richard Pryor

December 1st marked what would have been Richard Pryor's 68th birthday. As a belated commemoration, I've listed 13 quotes by the man that many (including me) call the greatest stand-up comedian of all-time.

1. Upon traveling to Zimbabwe: I know how white people feel in America now, relaxed. Because when I hear the police siren, I knew they wasn't comin' after me.

2. I had to stop drinkin', cuz I got tired of waking in my car driving ninety.

3. I'd like to die like my father died... My father died fucking. My father was 57 when he died. The woman was 18. My father came and went at the same time.

4. I believe in the institution of marriage, and I intend to keep trying 'til I get it right.

5. On race relations: I don't understand what goes on some times, right, cuz here we are in this theater, we gettin' along just fine. We go outside and the shit change.

6. The way I see it, the earth is going to be here after we're dead and gone. Even if it's a polluted planet, and they messed it up. Where do they go from here - to another planet so they can mess that up too?

7. I'm not addicted to coke, i just love the way it smells

8. On trying to find his roots: I went through every phone book in Africa, and I didn't find one god damned Pryor!

9. I'm for human lib, the liberation of all people, not just black people or female people or gay people.

10. It's so much easier for me to talk about my life in front of two thousand people than it is one-to-one. I'm a real defensive person, because if you were sensitive in my neighborhood you were something to eat.

11. I never met anybody who said when they were a kid, I wanna grow up and be a critic.

12. Rosa Parks showed us all that one little person can make a whole bunch of noise without so much as a whisper. She showed the world that the color of your skin shouldn't determine what part of the bus you sit in... as you ride through life.

13. On meeting Ronald Reagan at The White House: Muthafucka looked at me like I owed him money.


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