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The damage done in one year can sometimes take ten or twenty years to repair.

Chinua Achebe

When mother-cow is chewing grass its young ones watch its mouth
CHINUA ACHEBE

Man Watch Young
Among the Igbo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Art Conversation Eat Word
Just think of the work you’ve set yourself to do, and do it as well as you can.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Thinking Work Yourself
When a coward sees a man he can beat he becomes hungry for a fight.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Competition Coward Fight Hungry Man See
The only thing we have learnt from experience is that we learn nothing from experience.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Experience Learning Philosophy Wisdom
The damage done in one year can sometimes take ten or twenty years to repair.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Damage Repair Time
The language of young men is pull down and destroy; but an old man speaks of conciliation.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Destroy Language Man Old Repair Talk Togetherness Young
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
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
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Direction Neighbor People Story
Let the kite perch and let the eagle perch too – If one says no to the other, let his wing break.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Break Oneself Wings
It is praiseworthy to be brave and fearless, but sometimes it is better to be a coward. We often stand in the compound of a coward to point at the ruins where a brave man used to live.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Better Brave Coward Live Praise Worth
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.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Dance Hurry Lame Pleasure
In fact, I thought that Christianity was very a good and a very valuable thing for us. But after a while, I began to feel that the story that I was told about this religion wasn’t perhaps completely whole, that something was left out.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Fake Myself Religion Story Truth
If you only hear one side of the story, you have no understanding at all.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Hear Understand Yourself
A disease that has never been seen before cannot be cured with every-day herbs.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Carry Cure Disease Hospital
As a rule I don’t like suffering to no purpose. Suffering should be creative, should give birth to something good and lovely.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Creativity Love Purpose Rule Suffering
A functioning, robust democracy requires a healthy educated, participatory followership, and an educated, morally grounded leadership.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Democracy Education Function Government Leadership Participate
The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Different Kind Language Price Submission World
You do not know me,’ said Tortoise. ‘I am a changed man. I have learned that a man who makes trouble for others makes trouble for himself.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Change Learning Myself
A goat does not eat into a hen’s stomach no matter how friendly the two may be.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Friendship Goat Hen Stomach
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
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
What a man does not know is greater than he.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Greatness Himself Man
My son even if you want to fall, at least fall where your bones can be gathered.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Bone Fall Myself Son
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
Art is man’s constant effort to create for himself a different order of reality from that which is given to him.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Art Creation Effort Himself Reality

The damage done in one year can sometimes take ten or twenty years to repair.

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The damage done in one year can sometimes take ten or twenty years to repair.

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Popular Authors

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