Chinua Achebe
Chinua Achebe
Chinua Achebewas a Nigerian novelist, poet, professor, and critic. His first novel Things Fall Apartwas considered his magnum opus, and is the most widely read book in modern African literature...
NationalityNigerian
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth16 November 1930
CityOgidi, Nigeria
CountryNigeria
art reality men
Art is man's constant effort to create for himself a different order of reality from that which is given to him.
baby children lying
The world is large,” said Okonkwo. “I have even heard that in some tribes a man’s children belong to his wife and her family.” “That cannot be,” said Machi. “You might as well say that the woman lies on top of the man when they are making the babies.
who-i-am teach
Nobody can teach me who I am.
justice long people
As long as one people sit on another and are deaf to their cry, so long will understanding and peace elude all of us.
dancing want world
The world is like a Mask dancing. If you want to see it well, you do not stand in one place.
common-sense people demand
People go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there in front of them. This is what people have come to expect. Its not viewed as a serious continent. Its a place of strange, bizarre and illogical things, where people dont do what common sense demands.
men stories doe
It is only the story...that saves our progeny from blundering like blind beggars into the spikes of the cactus fence.The story is our escort;without it,we are blind.Does the blind man own his escort?No,neither do we the story;rather,it is the story that owns us.
humanity
We cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own.
giving advice not-good-enough
I grew up recognizing that there was nobody to give me any advice and that you do your best and if it's not good enough, someday you will come to terms with that.
art oil conversation
Among the Igbo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.
imagination layers privilege
Privilege, you see, is one of the great adversaries of the imagination; it spreads a thick layer of adipose tissue over our sensitivity.
shine-on shining sun
The sun will shine on those who stand before it shines on those who kneel under them.
men land battle
When the British came to Ibo land, for instance, at the beginning of the 20th century, and defeated the men in pitched battles in different places, and set up their administrations, the men surrendered. And it was the women who led the first revolt.
leadership healthy democracy
A functioning, robust democracy requires a healthy educated, participatory followership, and an educated, morally grounded leadership.