All over Harlem, Negro boys and girls are growing into stunted maturity, trying desperately to find a place to stand; and the wonder is not that so many are ruined but that so many survive.
Source: The Harlem Ghetto, in Commentary (New York, Feb. 1948; repr. in Notes of a Native Son, pt. 2, 1955).
-- James Baldwin, (Aug 2 1924-1987), US novelist, essayist; He was a noted spokesman for American blacks in 1950s-60s.