Wole Soyinka

Looking at faces of people, one gets the feeling there's a lot of work to be done.

— Wole Soyinka

Human life has meaning only to that degree and as long as it is lived in the service of humanity.

— Wole Soyinka

Seven is the magic figure, because that's a symbolic figure of my favorite deity, Ogun.

— Wole Soyinka

The youth should come together to challenge the status quo. They must not give up.

— Wole Soyinka

I have a kind of magnetic attraction to situations of violence.

— Wole Soyinka

Writers - human. I shudder to think how I must sometimes appear to others.

— Wole Soyinka

The media owes the responsibility to constantly tell the public the truth.

— Wole Soyinka

I have no money to give to you but I have ideas and organizational capacity.

— Wole Soyinka

My father used to tell me stories before I fell asleep. When the children would gather, at a certain point, I had…

— Wole Soyinka

My definition of slavery is the deprivation of human volition, any form of relationship between two peoples which is based on the…

— Wole Soyinka

When you start a political party, you are creating space for yourself. So many people were shocked when they realized that I…

— Wole Soyinka

Writers who open up horizons for other people are performing a function every bit as important as a consciously politicized writer.

— Wole Soyinka

Probably to me the greatest singer, female voice, is Billie Holiday. And one of the most moving for me, I don't know…

— Wole Soyinka

Arts and the Sciences are a natural symbiosis. They stem from the same human existential impulse - exploration. Exploration of what lies…

— Wole Soyinka

Before you're a writer, you're a citizen, a human being, and therefore the weapons of the citizen are at your disposal to…

— Wole Soyinka

I come alive when I have assisted in bringing out the printed word on the stage, you know, and I enjoy directing…

— Wole Soyinka

A war, with its attendant human suffering, must, when that evil is unavoidable, be made to fragment more than buildings: It must…

— Wole Soyinka

I believe that prizes are useful things for the disciplines, whether we are talking about chemistry or we're talking... It motivates, it,…

— Wole Soyinka

I think Nigerians got it wrong from independence as people became so conscious of the divisions because we wanted so much to…

— Wole Soyinka

Well, the first thing is that truth and power for me form an antithesis, an antagonism, which will hardly ever be resolved.…

— Wole Soyinka

Writers throughout the ages have one weapon, which is literature, but they also have their responsibilities as a citizen when literature does…

— Wole Soyinka

My understanding of the creative process is simply that all cultures and all concerns meet at a certain point, the human point…

— Wole Soyinka

One has a responsibility to clean up one's space and make it livable as far as one's own resources go. That includes…

— Wole Soyinka

. . . as far as the regime is concerned, well, the play is sheer terror for them. Because they feel, How…

— Wole Soyinka

I'm an Afro-realist. I take what comes, and I do my best to affect what is unacceptable in society.

— Wole Soyinka

There are different kinds of artists and very often, I'll be very frank with you, I wish I were a different kind.

— Wole Soyinka

But the ultimate lesson is just sit down and write. That's all.

— Wole Soyinka

I tend to work best as a one-man Task Force, including even the roles of messenger, coffee maker and office cleaner.

— Wole Soyinka

I don't have the sort of temperament that submits to Christianity or Islam.

— Wole Soyinka

Even when I'm writing plays I enjoy having company and mentally I think of that company as the company I'm writing for.

— Wole Soyinka

I like to say, 'I spend one-third of my time in Nigeria, one-third in Europe or America, and one-third on a plane.'

— Wole Soyinka

Pity you can't be present during my periodic fault-finding sessions with my image in the mirror!

— Wole Soyinka

The idea of having to make constant reference to politics is anathema to my calling as a writer.

— Wole Soyinka

I love beauty. But I like the beauty accidentally, not dished up, served up on a platter.

— Wole Soyinka

I've always written plays for the purpose of getting something out of my system.

— Wole Soyinka

Military dictatorship, you can focus on it, you can fight it directly. It's a band of power-driven people.

— Wole Soyinka

There is something really horrific for any human being who feels he is being consumed by other people.

— Wole Soyinka

Next to the commodities of corruption, and religion, however, Nigeria is the world capital of rumour mongering.

— Wole Soyinka

Art is solace; art is vision, and when I pick up a literary work, I am a consumer of literature for its…

— Wole Soyinka

Some of us – poets are not exactly poets. We live sometimes – beyond the word.

— Wole Soyinka