Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Quote by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

“I was aghast that a woman called another woman “my wife.” When I asked, Papa said it was the remnants of ungodly traditions, the idea that it was the family and not the man alone that married a wife, and later Mama whispered, although we were alone in my room, “I am her wife, too, because I am your father’s wife. It shows that she accepts me.”

Quote by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Work

Purple Hibiscus

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a renowned Nigerian author whose works delve into the intricacies of African life and identity. Born on September 15, 1977, she has garnered international recognition for her novels and short stories. more

You May Also Like

“The stories I used to read where men transformed into women suggested a kind of instantaneous loss—a sudden vacuum where their manhood had once been, both literally and figuratively. But what has happened to me has actually been a slow blossoming, a colonization of myself with myself. The estrogen dissolving under my tongue will enter my bloodstream and slowly disseminate throughout my body, just as the other pills I am taking will shut down production of testosterone in other parts of my body. Sooner or later, my cells will realize that estrogen is now my dominant hormone and begin to soften my skin, to grow my breasts, to thicken my hair. We are, none of us, a single set of destinies set by the accident of our birth. We can change and be changed. Our bodies know the language they must speak to make us the people we must become.”

“I can’t remember the words she spoke when they finally opened the garage door and yanked me inside, but I was petrified. It wasn’t sound Mom’s screams or the jolt of her grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me like a rag doll that plagues my memory, but the look of her eyes- wide, wild, and unrecognizable.”

“As a child, I ate up the image Carl strived to portray: An inspirational rags-to-riches tale of a go-getter emerging the hell of his sulfur-scented, Podunk Texas upbringing. With a community college dropout education, Carl managed to reach six figures as a mobile home lot manager when the trailer park industry boomed in the early nineties. He decorated his accomplishments with a large house, yachts, and weekly morale shindigs for his salesmen bursting with open bars and filet mignon. However, my mother was by far his prettiest accessory.”

“I finally got to a point in my life where I recognized the need to expand my team. In order to get ahead of some of the unknown weights in my life, I knew I should probably get a counselor. However, out of pride mostly, I took over three years to finally sign up and go to my first session.”

“Everyone involved in our children’s transition failed to adequately address or treat the full range of each child’s complex personality and history. The affirmation care model and those involved in it also failed to preserve the precious parent-child bond.”