Quote

Whenever I try to do anything on a typewriter, it's like having this machine between me and the words what comes out is not quite what would come out if I were scribbling.

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
Anything
Typewriter
Come
Typewriters
Trying
Machine
Would
Whenever
Like
Machines
Quite
Words
Comes
Scribbling

More quotes by Chinua Achebe

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Among the Igbo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.
Chinua Achebe
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If the clan did not exact punishment for an offense against the great goddess, her wrath was loosed on all the land and not just on the offender. As the elders said, if one finger brought oil it soiled all the others.
Chinua Achebe
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Living fire begets cold, impotent ash.
Chinua Achebe
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The damage done in one year can sometimes take ten or twenty years to repair.
Chinua Achebe
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One reason why I am quite angry with what is happening in Nigeria today is that everything has collapsed. If I decide to go back now, there will be so many problems - where will I find the physical therapy and other things that I now require?
Chinua Achebe
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Children are young, but they're not naive. And they're honest. They're not going to keep wide awake if the story is boring. When they get excited you can see it in their eyes.
Chinua Achebe
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Art should be on the side of humanity.
Chinua Achebe
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This is not pessimism but rather casting a cold eye on things. It is only one man's story, and I think that things will go better, but difficulties exist and nothing is served by hiding them under a poetic veil or under a lyricism of the past. I am against slogans.
Chinua Achebe
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In my definition I am a protest writer, with restraint.
Chinua Achebe
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Nigeria has had a complicated colonial history. My work has examined that part of our story extensively.
Chinua Achebe
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In such a regime, I say, you died a good death if your life had inspired someone to come forward and shoot your murderer in the chest-without asking to be paid.
Chinua Achebe
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The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use.
Chinua Achebe
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It has always been quite apparent to me that no important story can fail to tell us something of value to us.
Chinua Achebe
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Writing has always been a serious business for me. I felt it was a moral obligation. A major concern of the time was the absence of the African voice. Being part of that dialogue meant not only sitting at the table but effectively telling the African story from an African perspective - in full earshot of the world.
Chinua Achebe
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Only the story can continue beyond the war and the warrior. The story outlives the sound of the war drum... The story is our escort. Without it we are blind... It is the thing that sets us apart from cattle.
Chinua Achebe
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Africa is to Europe as the picture is to Dorian Gray-a carrier onto whom the master unloads his physical & moral deformities
Chinua Achebe
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[Would] a sensible man spit out the juicy morsel that good fortune put in his mouth?
Chinua Achebe
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The language of young men is pull down and destroy but an old man speaks of conciliation.
Chinua Achebe
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What I can say is that it was clear to many of us that an indigenous African literary renaissance was overdue. A major objective was to challenge stereotypes, myths, and the image of ourselves and our continent, and to recast them through stories- prose, poetry, essays, and books for our children. That was my overall goal.
Chinua Achebe
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I couldn't tell you why but now I know a story is in fact where you discover who you are, where a culture discovers what it is and I just think that this is a terribly important place to get into and that I would enjoy it.
Chinua Achebe