Wole Soyinka

“Waste, you know, is the most obsessive theme in my writings.”

“Under a dictatorship, a nation ceases to exist. All that remains is a fiefdom, a planet of slaves, divided into two categories: the servile and the rebellious.”

“A tiger does not proclaim his tigritude, he pounces.”

“The hand that dips into the bottom of the pot will eat the biggest snail.”

“Power is domination, control, and therefore a very selective form of truth which is a lie.”

“For me, justice is the first condition of humanity.”

“But the ultimate lesson is that there is no credit in being a victim.”

“My horizon on humanity is enlarged by reading the writers of poems, seeing a painting, listening to some music, some opera, which has nothing at all to do with a volatile human condition or struggle or whatever.”

“The man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny.”

“You cannot live a normal existence if you haven't taken care of a problem that affects your life and affects the lives of others, community, and nation.”

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

“I am not a pessimist. I am a questioner.”

“The greatest threat to freedom is the absence of criticism.”

“Books and all forms of writing are terror to those who wish to suppress the truth.”

“I don't know any other way to live but to wake up every day armed with my convictions, not yielding them to the threat of danger and to the power and force of people who might despise me.”