What’s good about writing is that when you write novels or fiction, people can see that the problems in one region are similar to problems in another region.
NGUGI WA THIONG'OHow did we arrive at this, that the best leader is the one that knows how to beg for a share of what he has already given away at the price of a broken tool? Where is the future of Africa?
More Ngugi wa Thiong'o Quotes
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Seen as an economic, political, cultural, and psychological re-membering vision, it should continue to guide remembering practices
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Why did Africa let Europe cart away millions of Africa’s souls from the continent to the four corners of the wind?
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Through the act of translation we break out of linguistic confinement and reach many other communities.
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Of course it’s very, very important for me to feel Kenya, to feel, every day, this is where images come from. So to be taken away from that by political pressure or other means – one is taken away from the area, which is the basis of inspiration – is difficult.
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For me, being in prison writing in an African language was a way of saying: “Even if you put me in prison, I will keep on writing in the language which made you put me in prison.”
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Christianity and Western civilization-what countless crimes have been committed in thy name!
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I’m writing for those people in Kenya, but in Irvine and in New York.
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So we’re talking about the Bible itself being a translation of a translation of a translation. And, in reality, it has affected people’s lives in history.
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And even in terms of justice, law codes, the legal system. A person who does not know English in Africa is excluded from that system because he can only operate through acts of translation.
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I’m more trying to connect; I’m more listening to people. Whatever I get is very meaningful to me.
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Any writer likes to be near the area which is the location of his work.
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We can appreciate each other’s languages. And the question of being uncomfortable about our languages would go away.
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So what I thought was just an African problem or issue is actually a global phenomenon about relationships of power between languages and cultures.
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The Bible affects everybody’s life who is a Christian, from the middle class in Europe to the peasant in Africa and Asia.
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Then they begin to see through their language that the problems described there are the same as the problems they are having. They can identify with characters from another language group.
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