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Poetry and slave trading cannot be bedfellows. That's where I stand.

Chinua Achebe

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Chinua Achebe
Age: 82 †
Born: 1930
Born: November 16
Died: 2013
Died: March 22
Essayist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Philosopher
Poet
Short Story Writer
University Teacher
Writer
Albert Chinualumogu Achebe
Bedfellows
Trading
Slave
Poetry
Stand
Cannot

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When a mad man walks naked, it is his kinsmen who feel shame, not himself.
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Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story even if on the surface it's far removed from your situation.
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It is praiseworthy to be brave and fearless, but sometimes it is better to be a coward. We often stand in the compound of a coward to point at the ruins where a brave man used to live.
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Unless I'm writing in the Igbo language, I use a language developed elsewhere, which is English. That affects the way I write. It even affects to some extent the stories I write.
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They have not always elected the best leaders, particularly after a long period in which they have not used this facility of free election. You tend to lose the habit.
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No man however great is greater than his people
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What a country needs to do is be fair to all its citizens - whether people are of a different ethnicity or gender.
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We cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own.
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Now one of the changes that must come to Africa is the idea of limited rule, I mean in term of how long one leader can stay in power. The era of president for life is not gone yet but it is on its way out and that is one of the problems with Mugabe and others.
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An old woman is always uneasy when dry bones are mentioned in a proverb
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Do you blame a vulture for perching over a carcass?
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The most awful thing about power is not that it corrupts absolutely but that it makes people so utterly boring, so predictable.
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A man to whom you do a favor will not understand if you say nothing, make no noise, just walk away. You may cause more trouble by refusing a bribe than by accepting it.
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Serious and good art has always existed to help, to serve, humanity. Not to indict.
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I think once you have done all you can to a manuscript, let it find its way in the world.
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As long as one people sit on another and are deaf to their cry, so long will understanding and peace elude all of us.
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When I think of the standing, the importance and the erudition of all these people who see nothing about racism in Heart of Darkness, I'm convinced that we must really be living in different worlds.
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If a child washed his hands, he could eat with kings.
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Nigeria has had a complicated colonial history. My work has examined that part of our story extensively.
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If you were to loose the habit of making the effort to get the book and read the words one by one you would have lost something terribly important. So I think that we have a task to ensure that this doesn't happen.
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