170+ (BEST) Inspirational Nikki Giovanni Quotes About Poetry, Love, Being Black & Writing

About Nikki Giovanni Quotes

Nikki Giovanni was born on March 7th, 1943 in Knoxville, Tennessee. She is a poet, a playwright and dramatic writer, and an activist. She is also a supporter for women’s rights.

When she was 18 she left Tennessee to attend Howard University and she graduated with a degree in Sociology and English. She then went on to teach at Tennessee State University and American University.

As a child, she was able to see the world through the basis of her writing, and many view her as a voice of the younger generation.

She was one of the first Black authors to be accepted by a traditional publishing house, she was the first African American woman to have her work endorsed by the Poetry Society of America, and she is the first African American Poet Laureate of the state of Ohio.

Despite all these accomplishments, she was not making enough money to support her and her children. In the 1970s, she made a decision to delve into the literacy field. Eventually she created a project called “Nikki Giovanni’s Book of Poems.”

Among her accolades are a Grammy nomination for her work on the Hamilton Mixtape, a Woman of Achievement Award from the World Arts and Cultures Council, and a NAACP Image Award.

In 2003 she received the National Book Foundation’s Literarian Award for Outstanding Contribution to American Letters.

Nikki Giovanni is an American poet, educator, editor, and author, who has been influential in the world of writing for over fifty years. Her influence on the world of writing is unparalleled. But this is not all she has done.

Giovanni has also been a professor at Virginia Tech, the University of Virginia, Cornell University, and Duke University. She has also taught at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Johns Hopkins University, and Harvard University.

Giovanni has written over twenty-five books of poetry, prose, and essays. She is a winner of the National Book Award for Poetry in 1991 for “Life on Mars.”

Famous Nikki Giovanni Quotes

Mistakes are a fact of life. It is the response to the error that counts. – Nikki Giovanni

I have a mind. I am a woman.

The more we try to understand one another, the more opportunities for love, joy and creativity we will find. – Nikki Giovanni

We’re living in an age of experimentations. We’re trying to see how people react to certain things. If we don’t know how to react, we don’t know how it helps us to grow. – Nikki Giovanni

If I am not mistaken, anybody who finds that they’re growing spiritually, and wants to go deeper into spirituality will have a hard time with that. The bigger you get in your thinking about God or your religion or your philosophy of life, the more you will understand what spiritual growth means. If you’re not growing spiritually, then there’s something wrong in your thinking. Your mind is not open enough to understand what it takes to grow spiritually.

I think the only way you can get over being a victim of racism is to be more than what they say you are. – Nikki Giovanni

If you take care of the things that take care of you then you will be taken care of.- Nikki Giovanni

I am a woman, a Black woman, and a mother; this trinity defines me more than anything else. – Nikki Giovanni

There is a great stirring in this country. Our people are rising up as never before and demanding their rights. It is not a time to sit idly by. – Nikki Giovanni

Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance. – Nikki Giovanni

I am all about words-written, spoken or thought.

Have the courage to use your own voice. – Nikki Giovanni

The problem with doing nothing is that you never know when you’re finished. – Nikki Giovanni

There are no shortcuts in life. We aren’t handed anything. We have to work hard for everything we have. – Nikki Giovanni

All great achievements require time. – Nikki Giovanni

Never underestimate the power of dreams and the influence of the human spirit. –-Nikki Giovanni

We can never know our potential until we push ourselves beyond our comfort zone.- Nikki Giovanni

I really don’t like giving advice because every person’s situation is different.- Nikki Giovanni

It is better to be hated for what you are than loved for what you are not. ––Nikki Giovanni

If you don’t understand yourself you don’t understand anybody else.–Nikki Giovanni

The greatest reward in being a writer is that it allows me to live many lifetimes and know so many different people from all walks of life.- Nikki Giovanni

Life is not about how many breaths you take, but how many moments take your breath away.- Nikki Giovanni

I find that the thing most people need from me is not advice, it’s simply to know that someone cared enough to ask. –-Nikki Giovanni

The more you understand yourself and the more you develop your character, the more capable you will be of dealing with other people in a way that they see them, too.- Nikki Giovanni

I am a woman, a black woman, and a mother; this trinity defines me more than anything else.  – Nikki Giovanni

We love because it’s the only true adventure.-Nikki Giovanni

An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.–-Martin Luther King Jr. (Nikki Giovanni’s father)

I am ever fascinated by the human experience and by, actually, human beings. – Nikki Giovanni

I am so hip even my errors are correct. – Nikki Giovanni

There are no shortcuts in life. We aren’t handed anything. We have to work hard for everything we have.- Nikki Giovanni

All great achievements require time.- Nikki Giovanni

We obviously need the truth. We’re living in a country of lies. – Nikki Giovanni

Inspirational Nikki Giovanni Quotes on Love

Love is the most instinctive and natural kind of connection you can make with anyone or anything. It’s as if you are born into it. – Nikki Giovanni

In this world, love is much like chocolate, not the kind of thing that you eat every day, but a special treat for special occasions-Nikki Giovanni

Not all those who wander are lost.-Nikki Giovanni

I have learned, the hard way, that you cannot love other people unless you love yourself.- Nikki Giovanni

Love is the most important thing in the world. Overcoming barriers and obstacles to achieve it is one of life’s greatest challenges and achievements. -Nikki Giovanni

If being a woman means being able to love more powerfully than any man, then I want to be a woman. – Nikki Giovanni

Love is not something that we should fear, but something we should embrace. Love is the most important thing in the world. – Nikki Giovanni

You are never too old to hold a heart that is willing to love again. – Nikki Giovanni

You know you are in love if it makes you feel sad when you are not with your lover, but happy when you are together. – Nikki Giovanni

I am all for love; it’s our weapon against hatred.-Nikki Giovanni

We love because it’s the only true adventure. – Nikki Giovanni

A woman who fears losing love has not yet found it.- Nikki Giovanni

The more you understand yourself, the more you can understand and accept others. – Nikki Giovanni

I have learned to trust the flow of love in my life, to let it guide me; I trust my own heart.- Nikki Giovanni

Love is something eternal, the aspect may change, but not the essence.-Nikki Giovanni

To be loved in return requires that you become lovable. – Nikki Giovanni

Love is like a boomerang, once it comes back to you, it never goes away.- Nikki Giovanni

To Love oneself, to know one’s self the most profound of all knowledge is to be loved.- Nikki Giovanni

You can’t love something until you know it.-Nikki Giovanni

We obviously need the truth! We’re living in a country of lies. – Nikki Giovanni

There is more to love than sex. – Nikki Giovanni

Other Famous Quotes About Love

Love does not claim possession but gives freedom. – Rabindranath Tagore

Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye. – H. Jackson Brown Jr.

Falling in love consists merely in uncorking the imagination and bottling the common-sense. – Helen Rowland

Love is a battlefield. – Pat Benatar

Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does. Love is a battle; love is a war; love is a growing up. – James A. Baldwin

There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it. – Edith Wharton

If there were no love, there would be no grief. – Euripides

When we can no longer change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves. – Jean-Paul Sartre

I am in love with the man who does not exist: the one I imagine in my heart, the one who can be, who will be, because I want him so much. – Paulo Coelho

Love conquers all: it even conquers hate. – Rainer Maria Rilke

Love is like a boomerang, once it comes back to you it never goes away. – Nikki Giovanni

This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet. – Rumi

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence. – H.L. Mencken

The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and let it come in. – Morrie Schwartz

Anyone can be passionate, but it takes real lovers to be silly. – Rose Franken

Nikki Giovanni Quotes About Being Black

The fact that many black people were mature enough to think of themselves as human beings, and not only was their breathing and blood vessels, but also their thinking one of God’s creatures – this was a revelation to me. – Nikki Giovanni

To be black and conscious in America is to be in a constant state of rage.- Nikki Giovanni

I was learning that the black condition was the most vital subject on earth, that black people were the true heirs of civilization- Nikki Giovanni

We create ourselves through what we love because when we are entirely caught up in something we are giving it all of our power.- Nikki Giovanni

There is more to love than sex. – Nikki Giovanni

If we cannot love ourselves, how in the world are we going to be able to love anything else?- Nikki Giovanni

If you look at life from the point of “How have you made me feel” then of course you are having a God experience. If you look at life from “How have I made him feel,” then there is no God.- Nikki Giovanni

Ask not what your country can do for you-, ask what you can do for your country. -Nikki Giovanni

If you don’t know where you are going, you will wind up someplace else. – Nikki Giovanni

I was loud and proud and full of passion and now I talk like a whisper- Nikki Giovanni

Black is the new red: we are people again tomorrow! – Nikki Giovanni

When you are black, it’s very easy to be funny. – Nikki Giovanni

breathe light, breathe love, breathe rhythm-Nikki Giovanni

The woman ain’t got no body shape, but she doesn’t want a man’s body- Nikki Giovanni

You might be too weak to love me now but when I hit you with the right calm, you can’t ignore me- Nikki Giovanni

Beauty grows on you like a tree flower and love is the sunlight that bursts through its leaves- Nikki Giovanni

When you love someone, it’s hard not to talk about them. When I think of Gaurav, I want to tell everyone how wonderful he is. – Unknown

Nikki Giovanni Quotes About Poetry

My poetry is my life–but I try to make it better. – Nikki Giovanni

Poetry is a bit of shorthand that makes you see beyond what you read.- Nikki Giovanni

I love to listen to what people say – that’s where the poem comes from.- Nikki Giovanni

I can be the poet or the poem and it doesn’t matter, as long as I live.- Nikki Giovanni

Poetry is a way of talking about things so they don’t hurt so much. – Nikki Giovanni

A poem is a window into the soul, and I am always anxious to see.- Nikki Giovanni

I love good poetry because it is like a breakthrough in thought and expression; just when you think you’ve walled yourself in from further knowledge or wisdom, you find with poetry the way out. – Nikki Giovanni

To be black and conscious in America is to be in a constant state of rage.- Nikki Giovanni

Nikki Giovanni Quotes on God

If there is a God, or if there is not a God, believe me, it makes no difference to me.- Nikki Giovanni

If there is a God, or if there is not a God, believe me, it makes no difference to me.- Nikki Giovanni

I believe in life after death and I believe in the miracle of every day.– Nikki Giovanni

I believe in the power of love to change people’s hearts and minds. – Nikki Giovanni

Dare to know that you are a somebody.-Nikki Giovanni

When you love someone, it’s hard not to talk about them. When I think of Gaurav, I want to tell everyone how wonderful he is.- Unknown

I believe in God at a deep level. – Nikki Giovanni

I believe that the gift of life is too precious to give up lightly.– Nikki Giovanni

If there is a God, or if there is not a God, believe me, it makes no difference to me.- Nikki Giovanni

Nikki Giovanni Quotes About Writing

You can be a good writer. The worst thing that can happen to you is in a position where you are forced to be good. – Nikki Giovanni

If you are not absolutely sure of what the feeling is, don’t try to write it down, because it won’t come out right anyway. – Nikki Giovanni

We all need our monsters sometimes. – Nikki Giovanni

The only thing I ask of life is to be important even if just for a minute. – Nikki Giovanni

I am a writer. I write. I have written. And I will continue to write.- Nikki Giovanni

Writing poetry is like shouting in a closed room and hearing your own echo.- Nikki Giovanni

We all need our monsters; they allow us to better understand who we are when we see them in ourselves. – Nikki Giovanni

The process of writing is the process of living and thinking about what you’re living and thinking about. – Nikki Giovanni

Writing is the only way of expressing what’s inside you. – Nikki Giovanni

To be a good poet, I think you have to love language, and to love language you have to be willing to take risks with it. – Nikki Giovanni

My poems aren’t for other people they are for me- as a way to understand the world. – Nikki Giovanni

The devil is in the details. – Nikki Giovanni