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 SOYINKAI can look violence in the face and either reject or accept it.
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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You have the entire gamut of human experience captured in the mythology of the Yoruba. This is what makes the Yoruba mythology a natural source material for me in my creative endeavours.
WOLE SOYINKA -
Arts and the Sciences are a natural symbiosis. They stem from the same human existential impulse – exploration. Exploration of what lies beneath the surface, and re-confuguration of elements of what we call reality.
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If man cannot, what god dare claim perfection?
WOLE SOYINKA -
We do not ask the mountain’s aid to crack a walnut.
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And gradually they’re beginning to recognize the fact that there’s nothing more secure than a democratic, accountable, and participatory form of government. But it’s sunk in only theoretically, it has not yet sunk in completely in practical terms.
WOLE SOYINKA -
Some of us – poets are not exactly poets. We live sometimes – beyond the word.
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But when you’re deprived of it for a lengthy period then you value human companionship. But you have to survive and so you devise all kinds of mental exercises and it’s amazing.
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I have one abiding religion-human liberty.
WOLE SOYINKA -
The hand that dips into the bottom of the pot will eat the biggest snail.
WOLE SOYINKA -
Power is domination, control, and therefore a very selective form of truth which is a lie.
WOLE SOYINKA -
Looking at faces of people, one gets the feeling there’s a lot of work to be done.
WOLE SOYINKA -
You accept whoever you are interacting with, directly, or indirectly.
WOLE SOYINKA -
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.
WOLE SOYINKA -
Mythology can be used, and has been used, even to re-state, you know, the very urgent problems of the world.
WOLE SOYINKA