If one will always have to feel white first, and African second, it would be better not to stay on in Africa

Art defies defeat by its very existence, representing the celebration of life, in spite of all attempts to degrade and destroy it.

What is the purpose of writing? For me personally, it is really to explain the mystery of life, and the mystery of life includes, of course, the personal, the political, the forces that make us what we are while there's another force from inside battling to make us something else.

In a certain sense a writer is 'selected' by his subject - his subject being the consciousness of his own era.

Success sometimes may be defined as a disaster put on hold. Qualified. Has to be.

Power is something of which I am convinced there is no innocence this side of the womb.

what a writer does is to try to make sense of life. I think that's what writing is, I think that's what painting is. It's seeking that thread of order and logic in the disorder, and the incredible waste and marvelous profligate character of life. What all artists are trying to do is to make sense of life.