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Quote by Teju Cole

“Our biggest art forms are film and television, and there hasn't been a great film about 9/11 yet, nor has there been a great television series. Something like The Wire gives us a rich and fully achieved picture of the wasteful, cruel War on Drugs; something like The White Ribbon gives a perspective on World War I that could only have been presented long after the event itself.”

Quote by Teju Cole

Author

Teju Cole, born on June 27, 1975, is a distinguished Nigerian-American writer known for his unique literary style and profound insights into contemporary social issues. His works, which include novels, photography, and essays, explore themes of race, identity, and globalization. Cole's debut novel, 'Every Day Is a Good Day,' won the 2008 National Book Award, and his photography and essays have also received widespread recognition, including the Photography Prize from The New Yorker magazine. more

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“Not in this specific form. But all great cities are inhabited by ghosts. A book of this kind could probably be written about Jakarta, Manila, or London by anyone who had a feeling for the invisible truths of those places.”

Kind Book Feelings Form Cities Written London Invisible Ghost Great Cities Manila Jakarta

Author:Teju Cole

“It is a work of psychogeography, albeit in a less explicit sense than Iain Sinclair's or Will Self's. It had to be fiction though, because I needed that freedom of including whatever belonged, and cutting out whatever didn't. The main fiction in it was matching Julius' generous and self-concealing character to New York's generous and self-concealing character. I think this also adds to my answer about New York's personality in the book.”

Thinking Book Self Character Answers Fiction Cutting New York Personality Needed Add Including Generous Explicit Matching Julius Concealing

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“Yes, there's a relaying of internal states that only a novel can achieve. In my view, the novel is one of Europe's greatest gifts to the world. America and Africa collaborated to give the world jazz. We'll call it even.”

World Giving States America Views Novel Achieve Europe Jazz Internals Greatest Gifts

Author:Teju Cole

“The strange thing, though, is that most people who write novels these days seem to be aware of only a fraction of its possibilities. Kundera goes on and on about this, and I never tire of reading him on the subject, because I agree very deeply with it.”

People Writing Seems Reading Novel Subjects Possibility Strange Goes On Agree These Days Tire Fractions Strange Things Very Deep

Author:Teju Cole

“At the emergence of the modern novel with Rabelais and Cervantes, all kinds of things were possible in a long-form prose work. Within a couple of hundred years, most of those possibilities were abandoned in favor of a text that efficiently transmitted sentiments.”

Years Kind Long Form Novel Modern Possibility Couple Hundred Favors All Kinds Prose Sentiments Abandoned Emergence Modern Novel

Author:Teju Cole

“I'm grateful for the likes of Kundera, Murnane, Markson, Berger, and, in his recent work, Coetzee. But no matter how celebrated they are, critics still consider them askance. Elizabeth Costello, for example, is a great novel, but it got quite a critical panning when it was published. The complaint was that it was simply a book of speeches, without the machinery of conventional fiction. Markson's books are compilations of facts and alleged facts, very artfully.”

Stills Book Matter Facts Fiction Novel Example Speech Grateful Critics Critical Likes Conventional Complaints Machinery Great Novels Compilation Coetzee

Author:Teju Cole

“The Australian Gerald Murnane, a genius on the level of Beckett, is known in Australia and Sweden but almost nowhere else. And I loved Reality Hunger, David Shields' recent novel take on the art of the novel.”

Art Reality Levels Known Novel Genius Hunger Australia Shields Australian Sweden Beckett

Author:Teju Cole

“The novelist loses, every time. Politics is insidious, the modern conduct of war (from shoulder-launched rockets to drone strikes) is insidious. Someone presses a button in California and twenty people are incinerated at a wedding in Pakistan. The killer is spared the sight of the corpses.”

People War Loses Modern Sight Twenties Presses Strikes Shoulders California Novelists Killers Buttons Pakistan Corpses Rockets Drones Insidious

Author:Teju Cole

“The novelist can't successfully depict such horrifying reality. But she can, and must, try, to bear witness. There are many ways of doing this; the mode I prefer is indirect.”

Way Trying Reality Bears Witness Novelists Indirect

Author:Teju Cole

“Echo is very important to me. I love the repetition of motifs, or the slight alteration of what's been said before. This is part of how one creates a mood, a psychological caul, in fact, around the reader.”

Said Important Facts Reader Mood Psychological Echoes Repetition Alterations Motifs

Author:Teju Cole