Quote

There is not a special imposition on writers to be activists. All that does is encourage writers to write propaganda.

Wole Soyinka

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Special
Write
Doe
Imposition
Writing
Activists
Activist
Propaganda
Encourage
Writers

More quotes by Wole Soyinka

Image
The Egba kingdom was one of the very last to be ceded to the British protectorate. It remained almost an independent entity within what is now known as Nigeria, simply because of its own traditional structure of governance.
Wole Soyinka
Image
Don't take shadows too seriously. Reality is your only safety. Continue to reject illusion.
Wole Soyinka
Image
I believe that each writer must decide in which language he or she is most comfortable.
Wole Soyinka
Image
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
Image
A human feast is an indifferent morsel to a god.
Wole Soyinka
Image
What I teach is literary criticism and comparative literature and so on and that's my function, but from time to time it's possible for me actually to help a writer. I read something and something strikes me then, I feel I can talk to that writer about it.
Wole Soyinka
Image
My understanding of the creative process is simply that all cultures and all concerns meet at a certain point, the human point in which everything is related to one another. That has been my creative experience.
Wole Soyinka
Image
My horizon on humanity is enlarged by reading the writers of poems, seeing a painting, listening to some music, some opera, which has nothing at all to do with a volatile human condition or struggle or whatever. It enriches me as a human being.
Wole Soyinka
Image
One thing I can tell you is this, that I am not a methodical writer.
Wole Soyinka
Image
But the ultimate lesson is just sit down and write. That's all.
Wole Soyinka
Image
Well, first of all I'll say that I come alive best in theater.
Wole Soyinka
Image
Pity you can't be present during my periodic fault-finding sessions with my image in the mirror!
Wole Soyinka
Image
I do not believe that it is necessarily the duty of the writer to give a voice to his community. If a writer is true to his vocation, to his or her vocation, the very process of creativity enlarges these human horizons. It provides insights, even when you're not writing, when your writing's not dealing with a concrete political situation.
Wole Soyinka
Image
Writers are human. I shudder to think how I must sometimes appear to others.
Wole Soyinka
Image
Governance can dig itself into a huge hole and not even know it's in there.
Wole Soyinka
Image
My mind immediately shot to South Africa the moment I sat down to think what I was going to write, what I was going to say. There was no other choice.
Wole Soyinka
Image
I don’t know any other way to live but to wake up everyday armed with my convictions, not yielding them to the threat of danger and to the power and force of people who might despise me.
Wole Soyinka
Image
A tiger does not proclaim his tigritude, he pounces.
Wole Soyinka
Image
I grew up in an atmosphere where words were an integral part of culture.
Wole Soyinka
Image
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