Wole Soyinka Quotes and Sayings - Page 1
More Wole Soyinka quote about:
- Art,
- Children,
- Corruption,
- Creativity,
- Crime,
- Criticism,
- Culture,
- Feelings,
- Fighting,
- Giving,
- Home,
- Humanity,
- Ideology,
- Inspirational,
- Justice,
- Literature,
- Morning,
- Mythology,
- Nigeria,
- Parties,
-
“My father used to tell me stories before I fell asleep. When the children would gather, at a certain point, I had a tendency to make up my own elementary variations on stories I had heard, or to invent totally new ones.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Only 4 sets of people can vote for the PDP: (1) those who are intellectually blind; (2) those who are blinded by ethnicity; (3) those who are blinded by corruption and therefore afraid of the unknown, should power change hands; and finally (4) those who are suffering from a combination of the above terminal sicknesses.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“The greatest threat to freedom is the absence of criticism.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“There is only one home to the life of a river-mussel; there is only one home to the life of a tortoise; there is only one shell to the soul of man: there is only one world to the spirit of our race. If that world leaves its course and smashes on boulders of the great void, whose world will give us shelter?”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Looking at faces of people, one gets the feeling there's a lot of work to be done.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“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.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“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.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“The writer is the visionary of his people... He anticipates, he warns.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“I'm not one of those writers I learned about who get up in the morning, put a piece of paper in their typewriter machine and start writing. That I've never understood.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Some of us – poets are not exactly poets. We live sometimes – beyond the word.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Well, I think the Yoruba gods are truthful. Truthful in the sense that i consider religion and the construct of deities simply an extension of human qualities taken, if you like, to the nth degree. i mistrust gods who become so separated from humanity that enormous crimes can be committed in their names. i prefer gods who can be brought down to earth and judged, if you like.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“I think that feeling that if one believed absolutely in any cause, then one must have the confidence, the self-certainty, to go through with that particular course of action.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“There's a kind of dynamic quality about theater and that dynamic quality expresses itself in relation to, first of all, the environment in which it's being staged; then the audience, the nature of the audience, the quality of the audience.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Power is domination, control, and therefore a very selective form of truth which is a lie.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“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 -
“The hand that dips into the bottom of the pot will eat the biggest snail.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Books and all forms of writing are terror to those who wish to suppress the truth.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“One thing I can tell you is this, that I am not a methodical writer.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Given the scale of trauma caused by the genocide, Rwanda has indicated that however thin the hope of a community can be, a hero always emerges. Although no one can dare claim that it is now a perfect state, and that no more work is needed, Rwanda has risen from the ashes as a model or truth and reconciliation.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“You cannot live a normal existence if you haven't taken care of a problem that affects your life and affects the lives of others, values that you hold which in fact define your very existence.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Being the first black Nobel laureate, and the first African, the African world considered me personal property. I lost the remaining shreds of my anonymity, even to walk a few yards in London, Paris or Frankfurt without being stopped.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“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 -
“Obasanjo has openly endorsed violence as a means of governance, embraced and empowered individuals whose avowed declarations, confessions and acts are cynically contrary to the mandate that alone upholds the legitimacy and dignity of his office.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“There's something about the theater which makes my fingertips tingle.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“Well, first of all I'll say that I come alive best in theater.”
-- 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.”
-- 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.”
-- Wole Soyinka -
“You go to conferences, and your fellow African intellectuals - and even heads of state - they all say: 'Nigeria is a big disappointment. It is the shame of the African continent.'”
-- Wole Soyinka
