We see our homeland more clearly when we are away from it than when we are in it.

The slogan of the revolution was dignity, social justice, and freedom. You cannot have dignity or social justice or freedom without women.

Many people come here and they think my apartment is a poor relative to my name. But you cannot be radical and have money, it’s impossible.

I have triumphed over both life and death because I no longer desire to live, nor do I any longer fear to die.

Interviewer: What would you say to a woman in this country who assumes she is no longer oppressed, who believes women's liberation has been achieved? el Saadawi: Well I would think she is blind. Like many people who are blind to gender problems, to class problems, to international problems. She's blind to what's happening to her.

I am very much against makeup and high heels and all that we inherit as 'beauty.'

To be creative means to connect. It's to abolish the gap between the body, the mind and the soul, between science and art, between fiction and nonfiction.