Home / Quotes / Quote by Wole Soyinka

Quote by Wole Soyinka

“The problem with literature, with writing, is that it works sometimes in terms of correction of social ills. Other times, it just does not suffice. The proof of that is the ability of a dictator to snuff out the life of a writer.”

Quote by Wole Soyinka

Author

Wole Soyinka is a renowned Nigerian writer, playwright, poet, and political activist. Born on July 13, 1934, in Abeokuta, Nigeria, Soyinka is known for his profound social commentary and critical literary works. His writings span various forms, including drama, poetry, and fiction, often exploring themes of race, class, colonialism, and African identity. more

You May Also Like

“Writers throughout the ages have one weapon, which is literature, but they also have their responsibilities as a citizen when literature does not seem to suffice. I mean, they are not mutually exclusive. One continues to write anyway but if you are called out to demonstrate, if people are being killed in the streets, it's hardly the moment to go for your pen and paper, you know, help in one way or the other.”

People Ifs Knows Way Writing Mean Doe Moments Helping Seems Age Literature Responsibility Streets Citizens Paper Weapons One Way Pens Exclusive

Author:Wole Soyinka

“I 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.”

Thinking Littles Space Creativity Quiet Isolation Interruptions Quiet Space

Author:Wole Soyinka

“As you get drawn more and more into other activities, like political activities, very demanding, you have to find different rhythms of writing; I think that's the word I'm looking for, rhythms of creativity which then, of course, become very intense. I think your writing then tends to be very intensified simply because there are other demands which seem equally important.”

Thinking Writing Important Different Seems Political Courses Creativity Activity Demand Intense Rhythm

Author:Wole Soyinka

“I think I'm a very lazy writer and by that I mean that I do not battle, I don't struggle too hard against it. If I have difficulties in the writing, I just go and do other things. I don't feel a compulsion to write.”

Ifs Thinking Feels Writing Mean Hard Struggle Battle Difficulty Lazy Compulsion

Author:Wole Soyinka

“I know there are other writers who sit down religiously every morning, they take their espresso, they put a clean sheet of paper there and they sit looking at that paper until they've finished or covered at least a number of those pages. No, I'm not like that. I have to be ready. It has to gestate it for quite a while and then it's ready to burst forth.”

Knows Numbers Morning Ready Paper Pages Clean Finished Covered Every Morning Sheets Espresso

Author:Wole Soyinka

“For many playwrights, they write the plays anyway because they've got to be, the work has been started, it's got to be finished, but we all long, I think, to see the plays fleshed out on stage and I'm exactly like that. Yes, I'm not satisfied until I actually see it on stage.”

Thinking Writing Long Has Beens Play Stage Finished Satisfied Playwright

Author:Wole Soyinka

“With theatre, you can interpret the most complex play on stage for it have meaning to an audience because you're dealing in images, you're dealing in action, you can use different idioms to interpret and clarify something which is obscured in the reading and of course there are different kinds of play, there are mythological plays, there are what I call the dramatic sketches, direct political theatre which is virtually everybody, but I find that you can use the stage as a social vehicle, you know, which any kind of audience.”

Knows Kind Different Play Use Action Political Courses Reading Social Audience Stage Direct Complexes Theatre Dramatic Different Kinds Vehicle Idiom

Author:Wole Soyinka

“I come alive when I have assisted in bringing out the printed word on the stage, you know, and I enjoy directing plays. It's a tactile process, theatre, unlike a number of other forms of the creative work.”

Knows Play Form Process Enjoy Numbers Creative Alive Stage Theatre Printed Creative Work Tactile Printed Word

Author:Wole Soyinka

“My understanding of the creative process is simply that all cultures and all concerns meet at a certain point, the human point in which everything is related to one another. That has been my creative experience.”

Humans Has Beens Certain Culture Process Understanding Creative Concern Related Creative Process

Author:Wole Soyinka

“I never know who's influencing me at any time. I mean, I can take a play by Brecht and adapt it, I'm consciously adapting that play, or, as I've done with the Greek classics, Euripides and Oedipus, and I'm consciously adapting that play. Whether it influences me or not, I think it's the critics, the analysts who have to decide that. Me, I don't feel that I'm under the influence of any such sources.”

Thinking Knows Feels Mean I Can Done Play Influence Source Critics Greek Analysts Adapting Brecht Oedipus

Author:Wole Soyinka