Don't take shadows too seriously. Reality is your only safety. Continue to reject illusion.
Wole SoyinkaRead
The novel, for me, was an accident. I really don't consider myself a novelist.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Wole Soyinka expresses humility, suggesting that his success as a novelist was unintentional.
In this quote, Wole Soyinka conveys a sense of humility regarding his identity as a novelist. He indicates that his foray into writing novels was not a deliberate pursuit, but rather something that happened without his full intention. This reflects a broader notion that sometimes, one's achievements may arise unexpectedly, challenging the conventional view of success as solely the product of ambition and intention.
Themes
HumilityNovelAccidentIdentityAuthor
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the nature of creativity, this quote can remind us that greatness often comes from unexpected places.
More from Wole Soyinka
All quotes →Trading and religion have always been aligned together in the history of the world, and especially on the African continent.
Wole SoyinkaRead
A war, with its attendant human suffering, must, when that evil is unavoidable, be made to fragment more than buildings: It must shatter the foundations of thought and re-create. Only in this way does every individual share in the cataclysm and understand the purpose of sacrifice.
Wole SoyinkaRead
Rwanda, which is one of the younger independent states in Africa, must be regarded as a model of how great human trauma can be transformed to commence true reconstruction of people. Human trauma can lead to stunted growth and mass withdrawal.
Wole SoyinkaRead
I have a kind of magnetic attraction to situations of violence.
Wole SoyinkaRead
Art is solace; art is vision, and when I pick up a literary work, I am a consumer of literature for its own sake.
Wole SoyinkaRead
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When we're done with it, we may find—if it's a good novel—that we're a bit different from what we were before we read it, that we have been changed a little, as if by having meet a new face, crossed a street we've never crossed before.
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