Wole Soyinka Quotes
Being the first black Nobel laureate, and the first African, the African world considered me personal property. I lost the remaining shreds of my anonymity, even to walk a few yards in London, Paris or Frankfurt without being stopped.
Quotes to Explore
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My second-grade teacher went around the class and asked everybody what they were going to be when they grew up. I said, 'I want to travel the world,' and he said, 'You'll be married and pregnant by 21, just like all the girls in this room.'
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Write how you want, the critic shall show the world you could have written better.
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When I was 16, I filmed an episode of 'Full House' where my family goes to Disney World. I remember putting on baggy overalls just to hide my stomach. When I watched it, I was pretty disappointed and bummed out looking at myself... I didn't feel good about my own body.
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The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world's problems.
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It baffles me that everything is so homogenized, because the world isn't, and yet we continue to support things that are so incredibly milquetoast.
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Before this learning experience, I had assumed that with regard to programs that sought to help people out of poverty, the political world was essentially divided into two camps: conservatives who opposed these for a variety of reasons, and liberals who supported them.
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Roosevelt was the one who had the vision to change our policy from isolationism to world leadership. That was a terrific revolution. Our country's never been the same since.
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The best way to resolve any problem in the human world is for all sides to sit down and talk.
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I love the fashion world. I love clothes. I love style.
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We must eliminate all nuclear weapons in order to eliminate the grave risk they pose to our world. This will require persistent efforts by all countries and peoples. A nuclear war would affect everyone, and all have a stake in preventing this nightmare.
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It makes me happy to think that this world of art-as-investment is a minuscule fraction of the art world overall. Most people who create, trade and own art do it for a much simpler reason. They just like it.
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You can have a revolution wherever you like, except in a government office; even were the world to come to an end, you'd have to destroy the universe first and then government offices.
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Every Yom Kippur, Jewish tradition requires a strict spiritual inventory. You aren't supposed to just sit around feeling guilty, but to take action in the real world to set things right.
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The country is too often assumed to be a backward place: The First World has trouble remembering that Haitians were two centuries ahead of us in abolishing slavery and in extending full rights of citizenship to everyone, regardless of race.
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Often Hollywood crews go into third world countries and I don't believe they behave well.
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I was never the smartest guy in the room. From the first person I hired, I was never the smartest guy in the room. And that's a big deal. And if you're going to be a leader - if you're a leader and you're the smartest guy in the world - in the room, you've got real problems.
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We really want to see how the idea of an intellectual action movie is received by the world.
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The world is full of things that upset people. But most of us deal with it and move on and don't try and burn the planet down.
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For me, there are no my people and strangers, no bad people and good people. All people are equal for me.
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God sent us here to make mistakes.
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Most people have come to expect an election now.
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'Les Miserables', the book, 'Les Miserables', the musical - it's about giving; it's about goodness. It's about compassion and love.
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Generally with the Oscars or the Emmys there isn't much you can do until the nominations are announced. Then you know what kind of year you're dealing with - what's been overlooked, what the issues are.
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Being the first black Nobel laureate, and the first African, the African world considered me personal property. I lost the remaining shreds of my anonymity, even to walk a few yards in London, Paris or Frankfurt without being stopped.
