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Whenever you see a toad jumping in broad daylight, then know that something is after its life.

Chinua Achebe

If you have leaders who are prepared to incite group against group it is very easy to manufacture reasons and excuses.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Easy Leadership Manufacture Preparation Reason 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
Dancing is very important nowadays. No girl will look at you if you can’t dance.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Dance Important See Yourself
When mother-cow is chewing grass its young ones watch its mouth
CHINUA ACHEBE

Man Watch Young
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Finding Neck People Time Water Yourself
A child cannot pay for its mother’s milk.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Children Milk Mom Pay
It has always been quite apparent to me that no important story can fail to tell us something of value to us.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Apparent Important Ourselves Quite Value
Nigeria is what it is because its leaders are not what they should be.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Government Leadership Politics
The world is large,” said Okonkwo. “I have even heard that in some tribes a man’s children belong to his wife and her family.” “That cannot be,” said Machi. “You might as well say that the woman lies on top of the man when they are making the babies.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Children Family Man Sex Tribe Woman World
Every generation must find its mission and fulfill it, as Fanon said – or betray it. So it is not something that you can write up on the wall, saying this is what has to be done. Every generation has to discover what it needs to do.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Discover Finding Fulfill Generation Mission Need
People create stories create people; or rather stories create people create stories.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Creation Inspirational People Story Success
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
In dealing with a man who thinks you are a fool, it is good sometimes to remind him that you know what he knows but have chosen to appear foolish for the sake of peace.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Deal Fools Goodness Known Man Peace Thinking Yourself
Only the story can continue beyond the war and the warrior. The story outlives the sound of the war drum… The story is our escort. Without it we are blind… It is the thing that sets us apart from cattle.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Beyond Blind Cattle Ourselves Warrior
The only thing we have learnt from experience is that we learn nothing from experience.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Experience Learning Philosophy Wisdom
Charity is the opium of the privileged.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Charity Opium Privilege
Every lizard lies on its belly, so we cannot tell which has a belly-ache
CHINUA ACHEBE

Animal Lying Philosophy
A functioning, robust democracy requires a healthy educated, participatory followership, and an educated, morally grounded leadership.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Democracy Education Function Government Leadership Participate
Wisdom is like a goatskin bag; every man carries his own.
CHINUA ACHEBE

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

Angry Man Stupidity
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Man Prosperity Rule Woman
We cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own. The Igbo, always practical, put it concretely in their proverb Onye ji onye n’ani ji onwe ya: ‘He who will hold another down in the mud must stay in the mud to keep him down.’
CHINUA ACHEBE

Himself Humanity Moral Practical Stay Value
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Experience Fiction Subject Theory
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
The world is like a Mask dancing. If you want to see it well, you do not stand in one place.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Dance Mask Place Stand World Yourself
One of the truest tests of integrity is its blunt refusal to be compromised.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Compromise Integrity Refusal Test True
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

Whenever you see a toad jumping in broad daylight, then know that something is after its life.

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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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Popular Authors

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