I can look violence in the face and either reject or accept it.
WOLE SOYINKAI don’t really consider myself a novelist, it just came out purely by accident.
More Wole Soyinka Quotes
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I began writing early – very, very early… I was already writing short stories for the radio and selling poems to poetry and art festivals; I was involved in school plays; I wrote essays, so there was no definite moment when I said, ‘Now I’m a writer.’ I’ve always been a writer.
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I am a very curious person; I’ll always ask: is this thing true, is it not true? And I use my own means to investigate and come to my conclusion.
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If man cannot, what god dare claim perfection?
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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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I never hesitated, as a student, in embracing the necessity of violence. In South Africa, I didn’t just accept it; I looked forward to it as a mission.
WOLE SOYINKA -
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.
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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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And I believe that the best learning process of any kind of craft is just to look at the work of others.
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A human feast is an indifferent morsel to a god.
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Looking at faces of people, one gets the feeling there’s a lot of work to be done.
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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.
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It’s the place to begin, always — to return to home, literally.
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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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When a leader encourages the culture of impunity, the society is lost and it makes the work harder for the rest of us.
WOLE SOYINKA