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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.

Chinua Achebe

The lizard that jumped from a high Iroko tree to the ground said he would praise himself if no-one else did.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Deep Lizard Philosophy Praise
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
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 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
There is a moral obligation, I think, not to ally oneself with power against the powerless.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Moral Obligation Power Thinking
I think not just Nigeria but I think the whole of Africa has to turn back to the rural areas and that’s where the majority of the citizens are and that’s where the engine of of development has to be found.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Development Finding Rural Thinking
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
A debt may get mouldy, but it never decays.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Debt Decay
Africa is to Europe as the picture is to Dorian Gray-a carrier onto whom the master unloads his physical & moral deformities.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Moral Photograph Physical
A child cannot pay for its mother’s milk.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Children Milk Mom Pay
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
We cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Humanity Ourselves Value
I think back to the old people I knew when I was growing up, and they always seemed larger than life.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Growth Life Old People Thinking
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 a tradition gathers enough strength to go on for centuries, you don’t just turn it off one day.
CHINUA ACHEBE

Enough Oneself Strength Tradition
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

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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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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Popular Authors

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