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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

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Wole Soyinka
Age: 90
Born: 1934
Born: July 13
Author
Essayist
Novelist
Philosopher
Playwright
Poet
Professor
Translator
Writer
Akinwande Oluwole Soyinka
Akinwande Oluwole Wole Soyinka
State
Conferences
Bigs
Continents
States
Heads
Even
African
Disappointment
Fellow
Nigeria
Fellows
Intellectuals
Shame
Continent

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I found, when I left, that there were others who felt the same way. We'd meet, they'd come and seek me out, we'd talk about the future. And I found that their depression and pessimism was every bit as acute as mine.
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There is not a special imposition on writers to be activists. All that does is encourage writers to write propaganda.
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Mythology can be used, and has been used, even to re-state, you know, the very urgent problems of the world.
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I have no money to give to you but I have ideas and organizational capacity.
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To achieve any change in the minds of the youth, there must be reorientation in terms of materialistic tendencies, corruption and crime generally.
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Governance can dig itself into a huge hole and not even know it's in there.
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The greatest threat to freedom is the absence of criticism.
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Sadly however, I discovered in one particular case that a colleague went and paid the bribe on my behalf, just to get our mission fulfilled. That was painful, and it strained our friendship.
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You accept whoever you are interacting with, directly, or indirectly.
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If I were sure I would pass the physicals, I would be on the next space shuttle to Mars or some other planet. I'll leave the calculations and the navigational tasks to you while I bask in your ingenuity. Find me a place in the capsule and watch me outdo Michael Jackson's moonwalk to the music of the spheres.
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Don't feel that you have to tailor your literature a particular way to please any school of ideology. There will emerge in its own right, effortlessly, some kind of ideological direction which is a reflection of your thinking and you want your thinking, above all.
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I consider the process of gestation just as important as when you're actually sitting down putting words to the paper.
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I grew up in an atmosphere where words were an integral part of culture.
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There's a lot of insincerity about the actions of our legislators they create distractions - like this anti-gay law you alluded to - and try to mobilise, to exacerbate people's emotions. Until the legislators started making laws, people minded, generally, their own business.
Wole Soyinka
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How do I feel when I am invited to a congregation of scientists? I feel quite at home. When they break into their cultic scientific argot, I know when I'm not wanted and step out for a drink.
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I am disturbed for instance when I read that a candidate said, 'I will not probe anybody or something like that'. You don't fight corruption by sweeping everything under the carpet, you don't.
Wole Soyinka
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The novel, for me, was an accident. I really don't consider myself a novelist.
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Intolerance has become, I think, the reigning ideology of the world today, the intolerance versus intolerance and it's taken on lethal proportions.
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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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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.
Wole Soyinka