Willard Motley

Willard Francis Motley (July 14, 1909 – March 4, 1965) was an American author. Beginning as a teenager, Motley published a column in the black oriented Chicago Defender newspaper under the pen-name Bud Billiken. He worked as a freelance writer, and later founded and published the Hull House Magazine and worked in the Federal Writers Project. Motley's first and best known novel was Knock on Any Door (1947), which was made into a film of the same name (1949).

Quotes

 * When the beer came Nick lifted and tilted the brown liquid in past the yellow foam. "Live fast, die young and have a good-looking corpse!" he said with a toss of his head. That was something he had picked up somewhere and he'd say it all the time now. Always with a cocky toss of his head.
 * Knock on Any Door (1947), Chapter 35