universal-equivalents:

“I certainly can’t imagine art for art’s sake … that’s a European approach, which never made any sense to me. I think what you have to do, which is the difficult thing about a writer, is avoid slogans. You have to have the [guts] to protest the slogan, no matter how noble it may sound. It always hides something else; the writer should try to expose what it hides.”

— James Baldwin, 1979 interview with the New York Times. See a collection of Baldwin quotes on writing here.