One of the truest tests of integrity is its blunt refusal to be compromised. Read Summary
A man who makes trouble for others is also making trouble for himself. Read Summary
When old people speak it is not because of the sweetness of words in our mouths; it is because we see something which you do not see. Read Summary
People create stories create people; or rather stories create people create stories. Read Summary
The people you see in Nigeria today have always lived as neighbors in the same space for as long as we can remember. So it's a matter of settling down, lowering the rhetoric, the level of hostility in the rhetoric is too high. Read Summary
I don't care about age very much. Read Summary
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. This is what I try to tell my students: this is one great thing that literature can do - it can make us identify with situations and people far away. Read Summary
Nigeria has had a complicated colonial history. My work has examined that part of our story extensively. Read Summary
The most important thing about myself is that my life has been full of changes. Therefore, when I observe the world, I don't expect to see it just like I was seeing the fellow who lives in the next room. Read Summary
I was a supporter of the desire, in my section of Nigeria, to leave the federation because it was treated very badly with something that was called genocide in those days. Read Summary
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. Read Summary
The relationship with my people, the Nigerian people, is very good. My relationship with the rulers has always been problematic. Read Summary
Oh, the most important thing about myself is that my life has been full of changes. Therefore, when I observe the world, I don't expect to see it just like I was seeing the fellow who lives in the next room. Read Summary
When a tradition gathers enough strength to go on for centuries, you don't just turn it off one day. Read Summary
When suffering knocks at your door and you say there is no seat for him, he tells you not to worry because he has brought his own stool. Read Summary
The whole idea of a stereotype is to simplify. Instead of going through the problem of all this great diversity - that it's this or maybe that - you have just one large statement; it is this. Read Summary
I tell my students, it's not difficult to identify with somebody like yourself, somebody next door who looks like you. What's more difficult is to identify with someone you don't see, who's very far away, who's a different color, who eats a different kind of food. When you begin to do that then literature is really performing its wonders. Read Summary
A functioning, robust democracy requires a healthy educated, participatory followership, and an educated, morally grounded leadership. Read Summary
What a country needs to do is be fair to all its citizens - whether people are of a different ethnicity or gender. Read Summary
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. Read Summary