Governance can dig itself into a huge hole and not even know it's in there. Wole Soyinka More Quotes by Wole Soyinka More Quotes From Wole Soyinka Some of us – poets are not exactly poets. We live sometimes – beyond the word. Wole Soyinka poet sometimes My interest in culture generally is a comparative one, and I think that's where the word joy, I think, can be applicable. There's joy in actually seeing the relatedness, the connectedness of different cultures or recognising, for instance, your own culture in another or another culture in your own culture and feeling an air to all of them. Wole Soyinka air joy thinking I think Nigerians got it wrong from independence as people became so conscious of the divisions because we wanted so much to satisfy the plurality of interests. I will say, we neglected the importance of real value, human value and the quality of potential in human beings and we contrived phrases like geographical spread, regional quota, etc and allowed mediocrity to reign. I think that is the problem that we are dealing with till today. Wole Soyinka real people thinking And I believe that the best learning process of any kind of craft is just to look at the work of others. Wole Soyinka motivational inspirational believe 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 communication social art Intolerance has always been with us, you know. The moment you have ideology, we have intolerance, whether it's the secular ideology or, you know ideocratic ideology, which always brings with it some kind of intolerance. Wole Soyinka intolerance moments kind I have no money to give to you but I have ideas and organizational capacity. Wole Soyinka organizational no-money giving When you are looking for corruption, you should look at the entire stratum of the society, while some forms of corruption are direct, others are indirect. Wole Soyinka indirect corruption looks There is something really horrific for any human being who feels he is being consumed by other people. Wole Soyinka humans feels people I grew up in an atmosphere where words were an integral part of culture. Wole Soyinka atmosphere grew-up culture Given the scale of trauma caused by the genocide, Rwanda has indicated that however thin the hope of a community can be, a hero always emerges. Although no one can dare claim that it is now a perfect state, and that no more work is needed, Rwanda has risen from the ashes as a model or truth and reconciliation. Wole Soyinka community hero perfect What 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 Soyinka criticism literature helping How do I feel when I am invited to a congregation of scientists? I feel quite at home. When they break into their cultic scientific argot, I know when I'm not wanted and step out for a drink. Wole Soyinka scientist drink home The British inclined more towards the feudal mentality, the feudal structures rather than the more radical progressive elements who would re-shape society and institute pretty egalitarian systems of governance with opportunity for even disadvantaged people and so I found that decolonisation was not just the end of political struggle in Nigeria. Wole Soyinka struggle opportunity people Pity you can't be present during my periodic fault-finding sessions with my image in the mirror! Wole Soyinka pity Writers - human. I shudder to think how I must sometimes appear to others. Wole Soyinka sometimes thinking I rarely use mythology for its own sake because, as a theatre person, the mythological figures are in fact humanity to the ninth degree and Yoruba mythology in particular has fascination of being one of the most humanised mythologies in the world. Wole Soyinka theatre sake humanity When I tried to create a new political party, which I stressed that this is not my party. I believe very much that there has to be a revolution and this is a party for the young. Wole Soyinka political party believe You accept whoever you are interacting with, directly, or indirectly. Wole Soyinka accepting When you start a political party, you are creating space for yourself. So many people were shocked when they realized that I was serious and had no interest in occupying any political position, so they started to fall out one by one. Wole Soyinka party people fall