If I hold her hand she says, ‘Don’t touch!’ If I hold her foot she says ‘Don’t touch!’ But when I hold her waist-beads she pretends not to know.
CHINUA ACHEBEAfrica is to Europe as the picture is to Dorian Gray-a carrier onto whom the master unloads his physical & moral deformities.
More Chinua Achebe Quotes
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Whenever you see a toad jumping in broad daylight, then know that something is after its life.
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No matter how prosperous a man was, if he was unable to rule his women and his children (and especially his women) he was not really a man.
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The sun will shine on those who stand before it shines on those who kneel under them.
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He is a fool who treats his brother worse than a stranger.
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A functioning, robust democracy requires a healthy educated, participatory followership, and an educated, morally grounded leadership.
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The only thing we have learnt from experience is that we learn nothing from experience.
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We shall all live. We pray for life, children, a good harvest and happiness. You will have what is good for you and I will have what is good for me. Let the kite perch and let the egret perch too. If one says no to the other, let his wing break.
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Among the Igbo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.
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Now one of the changes that must come to Africa is the idea of limited rule, I mean in term of how long one leader can stay in power. The era of president for life is not gone yet but it is on its way out and that is one of the problems with Mugabe and others.
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While we do our good works let us not forget that the real solution lies in a world in which charity will have become unnecessary.
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There is nothing to fear from someone who shouts.
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One of the truest tests of integrity is its blunt refusal to be compromised.
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Privilege, you see, is one of the great adversaries of the imagination; it spreads a thick layer of adipose tissue over our sensitivity.
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Do not be in a hurry to rush into the pleasures of the world like the young antelope who danced herself lame when the main dance was yet to come.
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When a mad man walks naked, it is his kinsmen who feel shame, not himself.
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We do not seek to hurt any man, but if any man seeks to hurt us may he break his neck.
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People say that if you find water rising up to your ankle, that’s the time to do something about it, not when it’s around your neck.
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It is the story that owns and directs us. It is the thing that makes us different from cattle; it is the mark on the face that sets one people apart from their neighbors.
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It is the storyteller who makes us what we are, who creates history. The storyteller creates the memory that the survivors must have – otherwise their surviving would have no meaning.
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And theories are no more than fictions which help us to make sense of experience and which are subject to disconfirmation when their explanations are no longer adequate.
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If you have leaders who are prepared to incite group against group it is very easy to manufacture reasons and excuses.
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Wisdom is like a goatskin bag; every man carries his own.
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When we are comfortable and inattentive, we run the risk of committing grave injustices absentmindedly.
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I don’t like to see mistakes on the typewriter. I like a perfect script. On the typewriter I will sometimes leave a phrase that is not right, not what I want, simply because to change it would be a bit messy.
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I prefer to go on trying all kinds of things, not to be told, This is the way it is done.
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There is a moral obligation, I think, not to ally oneself with power against the powerless.
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