Then they begin to see through their language that the problems described there are the same as the problems they are having. They can identify with characters from another language group.
NGUGI WA THIONG'OIf poverty was to be sold three cents today, i can’t buy it.
More Ngugi wa Thiong'o Quotes
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There is no way we can survive as a nation in the world without finding unity.
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How did we arrive at this, that the best leader is the one that knows how to beg for a share of what he has already given away at the price of a broken tool? Where is the future of Africa?
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Any writer likes to be near the area which is the location of his work.
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I think a repressive regime always fears people who are awakened – particularly ordinary people. If they are awakened, I think governments all over the world feel uncomfortable about that; they want to be in control.
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For me, being in prison writing in an African language was a way of saying: “Even if you put me in prison, I will keep on writing in the language which made you put me in prison.”
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So what I thought was just an African problem or issue is actually a global phenomenon about relationships of power between languages and cultures.
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If a novel is written in a certain language with certain characters from a particular community and the story is very good or illuminating, then that work is translated into the language of another community.
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In terms of language, English is very dominant vis-Ã-vis African language. That in itself is a power relationship – between languages and communities – because the English language is a determinant of the ladder to achievement.
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What’s good about writing is that when you write novels or fiction, people can see that the problems in one region are similar to problems in another region.
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Christianity and Western civilization-what countless crimes have been committed in thy name!
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Of course it’s very, very important for me to feel Kenya, to feel, every day, this is where images come from. So to be taken away from that by political pressure or other means – one is taken away from the area, which is the basis of inspiration – is difficult.
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And even in terms of justice, law codes, the legal system. A person who does not know English in Africa is excluded from that system because he can only operate through acts of translation.
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The Bible has affected their lives, but in translation, since they do not read the Bible in the original Greek or Hebrew.
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Many people do not know that Jesus did not speak Latin or English or Hebrew; he spoke Aramaic. But nobody knows that language.
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Our lives are a battlefield on which is fought a continuous war between the forces that are pledged to confirm our humanity and those determined to dismantle it.
NGUGI WA THIONG'O