I said: “A tiger does not proclaim his tigritude, he pounces”. In other words: a tiger does not stand in the forest and say: “I am a tiger”. When you pass where the tiger has walked before, you see the skeleton of the duiker, you know that some tigritude has been emanated there.
WOLE SOYINKAA tiger does not proclaim his tigritude, he pounces.
More Wole Soyinka Quotes
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The media must be used effectively to reach the masses. You have to find a new language in which to address the people and demonstrate what is possible.
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Colonialism bred an innate arrogance, but when you undertake that sort of imperial adventure, that arrogance gives way to a feeling of accommodativeness. You take pride in your openness.
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Well, the first thing is that truth and power for me form an antithesis, an antagonism, which will hardly ever be resolved. I can define in fact, can simplify the history of human society, the evolution of human society, as a contest between power and freedom.
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Very conscious of the fact that an effort was being made to destroy my mind, because I was deprived of books, deprived of any means of writing, deprived of human companionship. You never know how much you need it until you’re deprived of it.
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Alfred Nobel regretted that his invention, dynamite, was converted to degrading use, hence his creation of the Nobel Prize, as the humanist counter to the destructive power of his genius.
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To achieve any change in the minds of the youth, there must be reorientation in terms of materialistic tendencies, corruption and crime generally.
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The man dies in all those that keep silent.
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I don’t really consider myself a novelist, it just came out purely by accident.
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No man beholds his mother’s womb Yet who denies it’s there? Coiled To the navel of the world is that Endless cord that links us all To the great Origin. If I lose my way. The trailing cord will bring me to the roots.
WOLE SOYINKA -
It is the human potentials that interest me. I travel and everywhere I go I am amazed at the presence of Nigerians. The intelligence, integrity, productivity, initiative.
WOLE SOYINKA -
I cannot accept the definition of collective good as articulated by a privileged minority in society, especially when that minority is in power.
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Intolerance has always been with us, you know. The moment you have ideology, we have intolerance, whether it’s the secular ideology or, you know ideocratic ideology, which always brings with it some kind of intolerance.
WOLE SOYINKA -
. . . as far as the regime is concerned, well, the play is sheer terror for them. Because they feel, How dare – how dare anybody lift his or her voice in criticism against us? We have the guns. Their level of paranoia and power-drunkenness is unbelievable.
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History teaches us to beware of the excitation of the liberated and the injustices that often accompany their righteous thirst for justice.
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I believe that each writer must decide in which language he or she is most comfortable.
WOLE SOYINKA