What I can say is that it was clear to many of us that an indigenous African literary renaissance was overdue. A major objective was to challenge stereotypes, myths, and the image of ourselves and our continent, and to recast them through stories- prose, poetry, essays, and books for our children. That was my overall goal.

We have heard stories about white men who make the powerful guns and the strong drinks and took slaves away across the seas, but no one thought the stories were true.

Good leaders, competent leaders must see it as primary task to create friendliness. This something within the scope of most people. Now artists, like writers and sort of course have an added option of using their scale and talent with this in view. It is their business to create an environment in which our people will prosper and be happy.

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

Serious and good art has always existed to help, to serve, humanity. Not to indict.

When a man is at peace with his gods and ancestors, his harvest will be good or bad according to the strength of his arm.

If you were to loose the habit of making the effort to get the book and read the words one by one you would have lost something terribly important. So I think that we have a task to ensure that this doesn't happen.