The Novelist As Teacherโ: โI would be quite satisfied if my novels (especially the ones I set in the past) did no more than teach my readers that their past โ with all its imperfections โ was not one long night of savagery from which the first Europeans acting on Godโs behalf delivered them.
Chinua AchebeI try as hard as possible not to be pessimistic because I have never thought or believed that creating a Nigerian nation would be easy; I have always known that it was going to be a very tough job. But I never really thought that it would be this tough. And what's going on now, which is a subjection of this potentially great country to a clique of military adventurers and a political class that they have completely corrupted - this is really quite appalling. The suffering that they have unleashed on millions of people is quite intolerable.
Chinua AchebeI have found that I work best when I am at home in Nigeria. But one learns to work in other places.
Chinua AchebePeople go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there in front of them. This is what people have come to expect. Its not viewed as a serious continent. Its a place of strange, bizarre and illogical things, where people dont do what common sense demands.
Chinua Achebe