There is only one home to the life of a river-mussel; there is only one home to the life of a tortoise; there is only one shell to the soul of man: there is only one world to the spirit of our race. If that world leaves its course and smashes on boulders of the great void, whose world will give us shelter?
Wole SoyinkaWhat I teach is literary criticism and comparative literature and so on and that's my function, but from time to time it's possible for me actually to help a writer. I read something and something strikes me then, I feel I can talk to that writer about it.
Wole SoyinkaI think most writers would like a quiet space, complete isolation, in which they control their own time. Spaces of creativity in which there's very little interruption.
Wole SoyinkaI cannot accept the definition of collective good as articulated by a privileged minority in society, especially when that minority is in power.
Wole SoyinkaWe wasted a lot of creative energy in that immediate post colonial era, when there was a struggle between, you know, the Cold War between the capitalism and communism. Many writers just wasted their energy and their talent because they want to be ideologically correct and of course all they produced was propaganda.
Wole Soyinka