If I hold her hand she says, ‘Don’t touch!’ If I hold her foot she says ‘Don’t touch!’ But when I hold her waist-beads she pretends not to know.

There was a saying in Umuofia that as a man danced so the drums were beaten for him.

Nobody can teach me who I am.

Art should be on the side of humanity.

You don't ever want to say to a young person, You can't, or, You are no good. Some people might be able to do it, but I don't think I am a policeman for literature. So I tell them, Sweat it out, do your best.

I think dialects should be left alone. People should write in whatever dialect they feel they want to write. In the fullness of time, these dialects will sort themselves out.

That we are surrounded by deep mysteries is known to all but the incurably ignorant.