The collection / 44 fragments

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Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

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01Undated

Let no one be fooled by the fact that we may write in English, for we intend to do unheard of things with it.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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02Undated

Mr. Brown had thought of nothing but numbers. He should have known that the kingdom of God did not depend on large crowds. Our Lord Himself stressed the importance of fewness. Narrow is the way and few the number. To fill the Lord's holy temple with an idolatrous crowd clamoring for signs was a folly of everlasting consequence. Our Lord used the whip only once in His life - to drive the crowd away from His church.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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03Undated

When mother-cow is chewing grass its young ones watch its mouth

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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04Undated

Unoka went into an inner room and soon returned with a small wooden disc containing a kola nut, some alligator pepper and a lump of white chalk. "I have kola," he announced when he sat down, and passed the disc over to his guest. "Thank you. He who brings kola brings life. But I think you ought to break it," replied Okoye passing back the disc. "No, it is for you, I think," and they argued like this for a few moments before Unoka accepted the honor of breaking the kola. Okoye, meanwhile, took the lump of chalk, drew some lines on the floor, and then painted his big toe.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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05Undated

Storytellers are a threat. They threaten all champions of control, they frighten usurpers of the right-to-freedom of the human spirit -- in state, in church or mosque, in party congress, in the university or wherever.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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06Undated

Looking at a king's mouth, ' said an old man, 'one would think he never sucked at his mother's breast.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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07Undated

In such a regime, I say you died a good death if your life had inspired someone to come forward and shoot your murderer in the chest - without asking to be paid.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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08Undated

In such a regime, I say you died a good death if your life had inspired someone to come forward and shoot your murdered in the chest - without asking to be paid.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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09Undated

A man who calls his kinsmen to a feast does not do so to save them from starving. They all have food in their own homes. When we gather together in the moonlit village ground it is not because of the moon. Every man can see it in his own compound. We come together because it is good for kinsmen to do so.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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10Undated

In the end I began to understand. There is such a thing as absolute power over narrative. Those who secure this privilege for themselves can arrange stories about others pretty much where, and as, they like. Just as in corrupt, totalitarian regimes, those who exercise power over others can do anything.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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11Undated

Among the Igbo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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12Undated

Every generation must recognize and embrace the task it is peculiarly designed by history and by providence to perform.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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13Undated

While we do our good works let us not forget that the real solution lies in a world in which charity will have become unnecessary.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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14Undated

A snake was never called by its name at night, because it would hear. It was called a string.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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15Undated

The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use. The African writer should aim to use English in a way that brings out his message best without altering the language to the extent that its value as a medium of international exchange will be lost. He should aim at fashioning out an English which is at once universal and able to carry his peculiar experience.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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16Undated

As our fathers said, you can tell a ripe corn by its look.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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17Undated

I do not know how to thank you.''I can tell you,' said Obierika. 'Kill one of your sons for me.''That will not be enough,' said Okonkwo.'Then kill yourself,' said Obierika.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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18Undated

There is no story that is not true," said Uchendu. "The world has no end, and what is good among one people is an abomination with others.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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19Undated

If we have any role at all, I think it’s the role of optimism, not blind or stupid optimism, but the kind which is meaningful, one that is rather close to that notion of the world which is not perfect, but which can be improved. In other words, we don’t just sit and hope that things will work out; we have a role to play to make that come about.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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20Undated

The impatient idealist says: 'Give me a place to stand and I shall move the earth.' But such a place does not exist. We all have to stand on the earth itself and go with her at her pace.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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21Undated

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

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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22Undated

A child cannot pay for its mother's milk

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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23Undated

Most writers who are beginners, if they are honest with themselves, will admit that they are praying for a readership as they begin to write. But it should be the quality of the craft not the audience, that should be the greatest motivating factor. For me, at least, I can declare that when I wrote THINGS FALL APART I couldn't have told anyone the day before it was accepted for publication that anybody was going to read it. There was no guarantee; nobody ever said to me, Go and write this, we will publish it and we will read it; it was just there. But my brother-in-law who was not a particularly voracious reader, told me that he read the novel through the night and it gave him a terrible headache the next morning. And I took that as an encouraging endorsement!The triumph of the written word is often attained when the writer achieves union and trust with the reader, who then becomes ready to be drawn deep into unfamiliar territory, walking in borrowed literary shoes so to speak, toward a deeper understanding of self or society, or of foreign peoples, cultures and situations.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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24Undated

I feel that there has to be a purpose to what we do. If there was no hope at all, we should just sleep or drink and wait for death. But we don’t want to do that. And why? I think something tells us that we should struggle. We don’t really know why we should struggle, but we do, because we think it’s better than sitting down and waiting for calamity.

Chinua Achebe. / quote

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