Wole Soyinka quotes

Wole Soyinka is a Nigerian playwright, poet, and essayist renowned for his powerful works in literature and drama. His writings often address themes of oppression, tyranny, and human rights, blending traditional African theater with contemporary issues. He is the first African laureate to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Here are 131 of his quotes:

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 Soyinka

The man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny.

Wole Soyinka

The hand that dips into the bottom of the pot will eat the biggest snail.

Wole Soyinka

I think that feeling that if one believed absolutely in any cause, then one must have the confidence, the self-certainty, to go through with that particular course of action.

Wole Soyinka

Books and all forms of writing have always been objects of terror to those who seek to suppress the truth.

Wole Soyinka

A tiger doesn't proclaim his tigritude, he pounces.

Wole Soyinka

Don't take shadows too seriously. Reality is your only safety. Continue to reject illusion.

Wole Soyinka

We live in a materialist world, and materialism appeals so strongly to humanity, no matter where.

Wole Soyinka

Some of us – poets are not exactly poets. We live sometimes – beyond the word.

Wole Soyinka

My horizon on humanity is enlarged by reading the writers of poems, seeing a painting, listening to some music, some opera, which has nothing at all to do with a volatile human condition or struggle or whatever. It enriches me as a human being.

Wole Soyinka

I found, when I left, that there were others who felt the same way. We'd meet, they'd come and seek me out, we'd talk about the future. And I found that their depression and pessimism was every bit as acute as mine.

Wole Soyinka

I'm not one of those writers I learned about who get up in the morning, put a piece of paper in their typewriter machine and start writing. That I've never understood.

Wole Soyinka

One thing I can tell you is this, that I am not a methodical writer.

Wole Soyinka

There's something about the theater which makes my fingertips tingle.

Wole Soyinka

Power is domination, control, and therefore a very selective form of truth which is a lie.

Wole Soyinka

I grew up in an atmosphere where words were an integral part of culture.

Wole Soyinka

And I believe that the best learning process of any kind of craft is just to look at the work of others.

Wole Soyinka

But theater, because of its nature, both text, images, multimedia effects, has a wider base of communication with an audience. That's why I call it the most social of the various art forms.

Wole Soyinka

But the ultimate lesson is just sit down and write. That's all.

Wole Soyinka

Very conscious of the fact that an effort was being made to destroy my mind, because I was deprived of books, deprived of any means of writing, deprived of human companionship. You never know how much you need it until you're deprived of it.

Wole Soyinka

I don't really consider myself a novelist, it just came out purely by accident.

Wole Soyinka

Looking at faces of people, one gets the feeling there's a lot of work to be done.

Wole Soyinka