Writing has always been a serious business for me. I felt it was a moral obligation. A major concern of the time was the absence of the African voice. Being part of that dialogue meant not only sitting at the table but effectively telling the African story from an African perspective - in full earshot of the world.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of authentic representation in writing, particularly from an African perspective.
Chinua Achebe's quote highlights the significance of the African narrative in the global dialogue. He expresses a deep sense of responsibility towards representing African voices in literature, reiterating that it is not enough to be present in discussions; one must actively contribute to shaping perceptions of African experiences and stories in a manner that resonates with authenticity and clarity with the world.
In practice
In a keynote speech at a literary festival focused on diversity in literature.
In fact, I thought that Christianity was very a good and a very valuable thing for us. But after a while, I began to feel that the story that I was told about this religion wasn't perhaps completely whole, that something was left out.
Writers don't give prescriptions. They give headaches!
Mr. Brown had thought of nothing but numbers. He should have known that the kingdom of God did not depend on large crowds. Our Lord Himself stressed the importance of fewness. Narrow is the way and few the number. To fill the Lord's holy temple with an idolatrous crowd clamoring for signs was a folly of everlasting consequence. Our Lord used the whip only once in His life - to drive the crowd away from His church.
It is the storyteller who makes us what we are, who creates history. The storyteller creates the memory that the survivors must have - otherwise their surviving would have no meaning.
An angry man is always a stupid man.
Privilege, you see, is one of the great adversaries of the imagination; it spreads a thick layer of adipose tissue over our sensitivity.
Unlike all the other art forms, film is able to seize and render the passage of time, to stop it, almost to possess it in infinity. I'd say that film is the sculpting of time.
To whom does design address itself: to the greatest number, to the specialist of an enlightened matter, to a privileged social class? Design addresses itself to the need.
Hip-hop is one of the most free art forms there is. There's so many sounds you can use, so many things you can bring in. You never know, man. I bet years ago people would've never said they would hear me with Rick Ross, and we did four classic songs together.
Poetry is the only life got, the only work done, the only pure product and free labor of man, performed only when he has put all the world under his feet, and conquered the last of his foes.
When Basquiat was hanging out with Madonna and Fab Five Freddy, and all those worlds were colliding, people have to realize hip-hop and the arts were like this 'cause we both were outcasts: we wasn't allowed inside the galleries or inside Yankee Stadium. We were writing in the street and making music.
The lovely thing about writing is, well, two things. One, writing fiction allows us to bring an order to our lives that doesn't exist in real life. And two, it allows us to create human characters that we know better than we will ever know anyone in real life.
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