The same questions are there in Native American languages, they’re there in native Canadian languages, they’re there is some marginalized European languages, like say, Irish.
NGUGI WA THIONG'OPeople went to war as a result of it and even today, every Sunday.
More Ngugi wa Thiong'o Quotes
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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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What is translated from English and into English – and in what quantities – is a question of power.
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If poverty was to be sold three cents today, i can’t buy it.
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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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Our lives are a battlefield on which is fought a continuous war between the forces that are pledged to confirm our humanity and those determined to dismantle it.
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I think a repressive regime always fears people who are awakened – particularly ordinary people. If they are awakened, I think governments all over the world feel uncomfortable about that; they want to be in control.
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Through the act of translation we break out of linguistic confinement and reach many other communities.
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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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Seen as an economic, political, cultural, and psychological re-membering vision, it should continue to guide remembering practices
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Any writer likes to be near the area which is the location of his work.
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If a novel is written in a certain language with certain characters from a particular community and the story is very good or illuminating, then that work is translated into the language of another community.
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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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It was a revelation for me, in a practical sense, that you could write in an African language and still reach an audience beyond that language through the art of translation.
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I’m writing for those people in Kenya, but in Irvine and in New York.
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Those who strive to build a protective wall around it, and those who wish to pull it down; those who seek to mould it and those committed to breaking it up; those who aim to open our eyes, to make us see the light and look to tomorrow […] and those who wish to lull us into closing our eyes
NGUGI WA THIONG'O