"Twelve Years a Slave" Quotes

I don't want to live like this. I am a free man!

I now resolved that, however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact.

I was a stranger in a strange land, and my home after all was down in the Bayou State, where I was born, where my friends were, and where my kindred still resided.

It was a source of pleasure to me, in after years—whether the statement be true or false—that I was sold on account of my resistance.

I was not only a freeman but a well-educated one, able to read and write.

I was nothing. Less than nothing. Despised, abused, cursed—was the common lot of slaves.

I was now a slave, and the thought was a dagger to my heart.

There may be humane masters, as there certainly are inhuman ones—there may be slaves well-clothed, well-fed, and happy, as there surely are those half-clad, half-starved and miserable; nevertheless, the institution that tolerates such wrong and inhumanity as I have witnessed, is a cruel, unjust and barbarous one.

I prayed for light, and I trust I have been heard.

The secrets of slavery are concealed like those of the Inquisition.