Letter from Birmingham Jail Quotes

Martin [Luther King] wasn't one to buck forces too much.

[Martin Luther] King was one of the two young ministers - and you know how directly oriented the Negro community still is towards the minister as the leader.

Martin Luther King (Jr.) during the civil rights movement used to exclaim that he looked forward to heaven where he would be "Free at last." That is the inscription on his tomb in Atlanta.

I want to play Martin Luther King. I want to tell the real story, his demons, his struggles as a man, not just as a hero but fallible, I want to show that side.

I used read about Dr. King a lot as a kid. Independently, from being assigned it or being told by my parents or anything, I was just really excited about him. So I just started reading about him very young and was inspired by his legacy and looked to him as a role model.

[Martin Luther] King subpoened the nation's conscience. He was killed for it.

Dr. [Martin Luther] King was a human being. He had a sense of humor which was wonderful.

We [Americans] know Martin Luther King Jr. as a statue. We know him as a holiday. We know him as a speech. We don't know him as a man. Most people don't even know the whole speech, just "I have a dream." They don't know what his speaking voice was like, how he looked at his wife, or that he had four kids.

Martin [Luther King] wasn't, basically, the kind of person - certainly at the stage that I knew him closest - wasn't the kind of person you could engage in dialogue with, certainly, if the dialogue questioned the almost exclusive rightness of his position.

Because Dr. King was human and not divine - although we think he was divine, he was just a man, an extraordinary man, but a man - and he would get depressed from time to time and disappointed about all kinds of things relative to the movement.

Martin Luther King was a voice to the voiceless, and he did that tirelessly, and his faith was the engine to that. But he was just a human being, at the end of the day.

Anybody who takes Martin Luther King seriously has got to go beyond the standard understanding of who he was, has to connect those dots.

Martin Luther King was a human being with a brilliant mind, a powerful heart, and insight, and courage and also with a sense of humor. So he was accessible.

Martin Luther King was never an up close and personal figure in the United States.