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Certainly the people who are close to me are happier. They feel freer.

Nadine Gordimer

Well, you know, in the fundamentalist milieu of the Afrikaners, there was a sense that they were a chosen people, that they were bringing civilization to the blacks.
NADINE GORDIMER

Bring Chosen Country Fundamental People Sense Well
September 2001. A sunny day in New York. Many of us who are writers were at work on the transformation of life into a poem, story, a chapter of a novel, when terror pounced from the sky, and the world made witness to it.
NADINE GORDIMER

Chapter Country Day Life Many One Poem September Story Sunny Thousand Transformation Two Work Writer Year
I couldn’t be sufficiently interested in human beings to be a writer if I had contempt for human beings.
NADINE GORDIMER

Being Contempt Human Interested Sufficiently Writer
About the joys and the courage, I really don’t know what other people think. I just know that I’ve never left Africa. I’ve lived there all my life. And one of the wonderful things, in spite of all the terrible things that happen in South Africa, is the way people continue to keep their dignity.
NADINE GORDIMER

Country Courage Joy Know Left never Now Other People Really Think
Can you imagine a writer in England influencing? Absolutely not. And in France? It used to be, but no more-absolutely not. France used to, at least, have writers as diplomats, but not any more.
NADINE GORDIMER

Absolutely Country Imagine Influence More Writer
I have learned since that sometimes the things we want most are impossible for us. You may long to come home, yet wander forever.
NADINE GORDIMER

Impossible Learn Most Since Sometimes Thing Want
Sentiment is for those who don’t know what to do next.
NADINE GORDIMER

Do Know Next Sentiment Those To What
Everyone ends up moving alone towards the self
NADINE GORDIMER

Alone End Everyone Move Self Toward
From Ernest Hemingway’s stories I learned to listen within my stories for what went unsaid by my characters.
NADINE GORDIMER

Character Country From Learn Listen People Person Place Story Unsaid Went
It’s easier for the former masters to put aside the masks that hid their humanity than for the former slaves to recognise the faces underneath. Or to trust that this is not a new mask these are wearing.
NADINE GORDIMER

Aside Dormer Easier Face Former Humanity Mask Master Put Recognise Slave Underneath
The creative act is not pure. History evidences it. Ideology demands it. Society exacts it.
NADINE GORDIMER

Act Creative Demand Evidence Exact Ideology Pure Society
a writer doesn’t only need the time when he’s actually writing – he or she has got to have time to think and time just to let things work out. Nothing is worse for this than society. Nothing is worse for this than the abrasive, if enjoyable, effect of other people.
NADINE GORDIMER

Actual Got Need Out She Thing Think Time Work Writer Writing
Responsibility is what awaits outside the Eden of Creativity.
NADINE GORDIMER

Await Creativity Outside Responsibility
Censorship may have to do with literature; but literature has nothing whatever to do with censorship.
NADINE GORDIMER

Censorship Do Literature May Nothing Whatever
Humans, the only self-regarding animals, blessed or cursed with this torturing higher faculty, have always wanted to know why.
NADINE GORDIMER

Animal Bless Curse Faculty Higher Human Only Regard Self Torture Want Why
Can you imagine writers influencing things in America? Can you imagine a writer in England influencing? Absolutely not. And in France? It used to be, but no more – absolutely not. France used to, at least, have writers as diplomats, but not any more.
NADINE GORDIMER

Absolutely Country Imagine Influence Thing Writer

Certainly the people who are close to me are happier. They feel freer.

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Certainly the people who are close to me are happier. They feel freer.

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