Discourse [on Colonialism] calls on the world to move forward as rapidly as possible, and yet calls for the overthrow of a master class’s ideology of progress, one built on violence, destruction, genocide.”
-- Robin Kelley (Introduction)

Importance: Here in the introduction, Robin Kelley captures the overarching thesis and tone of Césaire's work in Discourse on Colonialism. It is at once angry about the past, and conservatively hopeful for the future.

For civilizations, exchange is oxygen; that the great good fortune of Europe is to have been a crossroads, and that because it was the locus of all ideas, the receptacle of all philosophies, the meeting place of all sentiments… But then I ask the following question: has colonization really placed civilizations in contact?"
-- Aimé Césaire (Pages 31-34)

Importance: In this passage, Césaire clarifies that there are both good and bad kinds of civilizational contact. While defenders of colonialism have tried to ignore the differences between them...