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People Quotes by Chinua Achebe

51 People quotes by Chinua Achebe

All People quotes Chinua Achebe’s page

Chinua Achebe describes how reading stories opens doors to other lands and cultures. He believes artists should stand with the oppressed against powerful rulers. He also warns that power can make people boring and predictable, and that identifying with characters lets us see ourselves in distant tales.

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I don't praise my people. I am their greatest critic.

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No man however great is greater than his people

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People create stories create people; or rather stories create people create stories.

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Stories serve the purpose of consolidating whatever gains people or their leaders have made or imagine they have made in their existing…

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People go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there…

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People say that if you find water rising up to your ankle, that's the time to do something about it, not when…

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As long as one people sit on another and are deaf to their cry, so long will understanding and peace elude all…

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The most awful thing about power is not that it corrupts absolutely but that it makes people so utterly boring, so predictable.

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I think back to the old people I knew when I was growing up, and they always seemed larger than life.

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What a country needs to do is be fair to all its citizens - whether people are of a different ethnicity or…

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The women are, of course, the biggest single group of oppressed people in the world and, if we are to believe the…

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There are people who say that if you are told that your house has fallen you don't ask what about the ceiling…

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If the economy of a country collapses completely and the hospitals are no longer able to function as hospitals, it will be…

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Africa is people" may seem too simple and too obvious to some of us. But I have found in the course of…

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Good leaders, competent leaders must see it as primary task to create friendliness. This something within the scope of most people. Now…

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People go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there…

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At the most one could say that his chi or ... personal god was good. But the Ibo people have a proverb…

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When I think of the standing, the importance and the erudition of all these people who see nothing about racism in Heart…

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Americans, it seems to me, tend to protect their children from the harshness of life, in their interest. That's not the way…

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Those who are talking sharia in Nigeria are really just politicians exploiting what they think is available. But if it should turn…

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I try as hard as possible not to be pessimistic because I have never thought or believed that creating a Nigerian nation…

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The ordinary Nigerians have lived as neighbors down the millennia. I was talking about the British who came and merged a whole…

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For people who are coming out of an oral tradition, it is very exciting to get into reading and writing and it…

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Almost 30 years before Rwanda, before Darfur, more than 2 million people – mothers, children, babies, civilians – lost their lives as…

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Colonial rule means that power, initiative is taken away from you by somebody else who makes your decisions. If that goes on…

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If I say look unless you change your leaders I will not give you any aid, you are likely to have people…

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What really worries me is that those who are in positions of power are not really affected by what we are writing.…

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When I began going to school and learned to read, I encountered stories of other people and other lands.

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It is the story that owns and directs us. It is the thing that makes us different from cattle; it is the…

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The relationship with my people, the Nigerian people, is very good. My relationship with the rulers has always been problematic.

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I don't care about age very much. I think back to the old people I knew when I was growing up, and…

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Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story…

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When old people speak it is not because of the sweetness of words in our mouths; it is because we see something…

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Age was respected among his people, but achievement was revered. As the elders said, if a child washed his hands he could…

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The rural areas have been deprived by the cities in the past. Development resources and energy should be directed where the people…

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There is no story that is not true, [...] The world has no end, and what is good among one people is…

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I think dialects should be left alone. People should write in whatever dialect they feel they want to write. In the fullness…

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I am against people reaping where they have not sown. But we have a saying that if you want to eat a…

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Each of my books is different. Deliberately... I wanted to create my society, my people, in their fullness.

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People from different parts of the world can respond to the same story if it says something to them about their own…

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More by Chinua Achebe

“In such a regime, I say you died a good death if your life had inspired someone to come forward and shoot your murdered…

“Do not despair. I know you will not despair. You have a manly and a proud heart. A proud heart can survive a general…

My son even if you want to fall, at least fall where your bones can be gathered

“And so Mr. Brown came to be respected even by the clan, because he trod softly on its faith.”

“I have learned that a man who makes trouble for others is also making it for himself.”

In fact, I thought that Christianity was very a good and a very valuable thing for us. But after a while, I began to…

I find Nigeria very frustrating. I am not alone in this. There are many Nigerians abroad. As you know, the brain drain is just…

I do not actually see how art, literature can be anything other that being in that domain of trying to tell us, trying to…

Democracy is not something you put away for ten years, and then in the 11th year you wake up and start practicing again. We…

When there is a big tree small ones climb on its back to reach the sun.

When I began going to school and learned to read, I encountered stories of other people and other lands. In one of my essays,…

Almost nobody dances sober, unless they happen to be insane. H. P. LOVECRAFT, attributed, Telling It Like It Is Dancing is very important nowadays.…

This is why I find racism impossible, because this is against humanity.

“Then listen to me,' he said and cleared his throat. 'It's true that a child belongs to its father. But when a father beats…

What you must accept is that your life is not going to be the same while you are writing.