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The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use.

Chinua Achebe

Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story even if on the surface it’s far removed from your situation.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Beginning Identify People Removal Situation Story Yourself
When old people speak it is not because of the sweetness of words in our mouths; it is because we see something which you do not see.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Mouth Old Ourselves People Sweet
Dancing is very important nowadays. No girl will look at you if you can’t dance.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Dance Important See Yourself
Privilege, you see, is one of the great adversaries of the imagination; it spreads a thick layer of adipose tissue over our sensitivity.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Greatness Imagination Man Privilege Yourself
I prefer to go on trying all kinds of things, not to be told, This is the way it is done.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Adventure Kindness Myself Way
If one finger brings oil it soils the others.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Fingering Oneself
People go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there in front of them.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Confirm Failure Head People See
When I began going to school and learned to read, I encountered stories of other people and other lands.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Beginning Education Land Learning Myself People
We do not seek to hurt any man, but if any man seeks to hurt us may he break his neck.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Break Hurt Man Neck Seek
Storytellers are a threat. They threaten all champions of control, they frighten usurpers of the right-to-freedom of the human spirit — in state, in church or mosque, in party congress, in the university or wherever.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Control Freedom Human Religion Spirit Threat
When suffering knocks at your door and you say there is no seat for him, he tells you not to worry because he has brought his own stool.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Door Hard Time Himself Knock Suffering Worry
The impatient idealist says: ‘Give me a place to stand and I shall move the earth.’ But such a place does not exist. We all have to stand on the earth itself and go with her at her pace.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Earth Existence Ideal Myself Place
If you don’t like someone’s story, write your own. If you don’t like what somebody says, say what it is you don’t like.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Expression Feeling Story Talk
The problem with leaderless uprisings taking over is that you don’t always know what you get at the other end. If you are not careful you could replace a bad government with one much worse!
CHINUA ACHEBE

End Government Known Leadership Oneself Problem Worst
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Change Mistake Myself Perfection Script See Simplicity
Nigeria is what it is because its leaders are not what they should be.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Government Leadership Politics
Become familiar with your home, but know also about your neighbors. The young man who never went anywhere thinks his mother is the greatest cook.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Cook Greatness Home Known Mom Neighbor
The damage done in one year can sometimes take ten or twenty years to repair.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Damage Repair Time
The man that brings ant-infested faggots into his hut should not grumble when lizards begin to pay him a visit.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Beginning Himself Man Pay Visit
Wisdom is like a goatskin bag; every man carries his own.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Carry Himself Man Wisdom
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Change Ideas Leadership Limitation Power Problem Stay
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Break Children Live Prayer Wing
We cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Humanity Ourselves Value
What a man does not know is greater than he.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Greatness Himself Man
An angry man is always a stupid man.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Angry Man Stupidity
If you don’t like someone’s story, write your own.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Inspirational Motivational Writing Yourself
One reason why I am quite angry with what is happening in Nigeria today is that everything has collapsed. If I decide to go back now, there will be so many problems – where will I find the physical therapy and other things that I now require?
CHINUA ACHEBE

Angry Collapse Quit Reason Therapy Trouble

The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use.

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The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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