Top 200 Chinua Achebe Quotes (2025 Update)
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101. “They say a man is like a funeral ram which must take whatever beating comes to it without opening its mouth; only the silent tremor of pain down its body tells of its suffering.”

— Chinua Achebe

102. “As our fathers said, you can tell a ripe corn by its look.”

— Chinua Achebe

103. “The impatient idealist says: ‘Give me a place to stand and I shall move the earth.’ But such a place does not exist. We all have to stand on the earth itself and go with her at her pace.”

— Chinua Achebe

104. “A man to whom you do a favor will not understand if you say nothing, make no noise, just walk away. You may cause more trouble by refusing a bribe than by accepting it.”

— Chinua Achebe

105. “Children are young, but they’re not naive. And they’re honest. They’re not going to keep wide awake if the story is boring. When they get excited you can see it in their eyes.”

— Chinua Achebe

106. “Almost nobody dances sober, unless they happen to be insane. H. P. LOVECRAFT, attributed, Telling It Like It Is Dancing is very important nowadays. No girl will look at you if you can’t dance.”

— Chinua Achebe

107. “If one finger brings oil it soils the others.”

— Chinua Achebe

108. “When a new saying gets to the land of empty men, they lose their heads over it.”

— Chinua Achebe

109. “No man however great is greater than his people.”

— Chinua Achebe

110. “Don’t disparage the day that still has an hour of light in its hand.”

— Chinua Achebe

111. “What a country needs to do is be fair to all its citizens – whether people are of a different ethnicity or gender.”

— Chinua Achebe

112. “Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story even if on the surface it’s far removed from your situation.”

— Chinua Achebe

113. “I have so many ideas; there are so many things that need to be done, so many possibilities, you know; one is terribly excited, but at the same time, you’re almost confused, because you don’t know where to begin.”

— Chinua Achebe

114. “Privilege, you see, is one of the great adversaries of the imagination; it spreads a thick layer of adipose tissue over our sensitivity.”

— Chinua Achebe

115. “Writers don’t give prescriptions. They give headaches!”

— Chinua Achebe

116. “The language of young men is pull down and destroy; but an old man speaks of conciliation.”

— Chinua Achebe

117. “At the end of the thirty-month war Biafra was a vast smoldering rubble. The head count at the end of the war was perhaps three million dead, which was approximately 20 percent of the entire population.”

— Chinua Achebe

118. “The price a world language must be prepared to pay is submission to many different kinds of use. The African writer should aim to use English in a way that brings out his message best without altering the language to the extent that its value as a medium of international exchange will be lost. He should aim at fashioning out an English which is at once universal and able to carry his peculiar experience.”

— Chinua Achebe

119. “People from different parts of the world can respond to the same story if it says something to them about their own history and their own experience.”

— Chinua Achebe

120. “Real tragedy is never resolved. It goes on hopelessly for ever.”

— Chinua Achebe

121. “A chief does not hurry.”

— Chinua Achebe

122. “It is difficult to express the reality of Ibo society in classical English.”

— Chinua Achebe

123. “In my definition I am a protest writer, with restraint.”

— Chinua Achebe

124. “People go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there in front of them.”

— Chinua Achebe

125. “Nations enshrine mediocrity as their modus operandi, and create the fertile ground for the rise of tyrants and other base elements of the society, by silently assenting to the dismantling of systems of excellence because they do not immediately benefit one specific ethnic, racial, political, or special-interest group. That, in my humble opinion, is precisely where Nigeria finds itself today!”

— Chinua Achebe

126. “We shall all live. We pray for life, children, a good harvest and happiness. You will have what is good for you and I will have what is good for me. Let the kite perch and let the egret perch too. If one says no to the other, let his wing break.”

— Chinua Achebe

127. “A person who has not secured a place on the floor should not begin to look for a mat.”

— Chinua Achebe

128. “A proud heart can survive a general failure because such a failure does not prick its pride.”

— Chinua Achebe

129. “He who fights for a ne’er-do-well has nothing to show for it except a head covered in earth and grime.”

— Chinua Achebe

130. “As long as one people sit on another and are deaf to their cry, so long will understanding and peace elude all of us.”

— Chinua Achebe

131. “Fortunately, among these people a man was judged according to his worth and not according to the worth of his father.”

— Chinua Achebe

132. “We do not ask for wealth because he that has health and children will also have wealth. We do not pray to have money but to have more kinsmen. We are better than animals because we have kinsmen. An animal rubs its itching flank against a tree, a man asks his kinsman to scratch him.”

— Chinua Achebe

133. “We have heard stories about white men who make the powerful guns and the strong drinks and took slaves away across the seas, but no one thought the stories were true.”

— Chinua Achebe

134. “If the clan did not exact punishment for an offense against the great goddess, her wrath was loosed on all the land and not just on the offender. As the elders said, if one finger brought oil it soiled all the others.”

— Chinua Achebe

135. “I am against people reaping where they have not sown. But we have a saying that if you want to eat a toad you should look for a fat and juicy one.”

— Chinua Achebe

136. “If we have any role at all, I think it’s the role of optimism, not blind or stupid optimism, but the kind which is meaningful, one that is rather close to that notion of the world which is not perfect, but which can be improved. In other words, we don’t just sit and hope that things will work out; we have a role to play to make that come about.”

— Chinua Achebe

137. “Looking at a king’s mouth, ′ said an old man, ’one would think he never sucked at his mother’s breast.”

— Chinua Achebe

138. “A child cannot pay for its mother’s milk.”

— Chinua Achebe

139. “A functioning, robust democracy requires a healthy educated, participatory followership, and an educated, morally grounded leadership.”

— Chinua Achebe

140. “Having spoken plainly so far, Okoye said the next half a dozen sentences in proverbs. Among the Ibo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.”

— Chinua Achebe

141. “A snake was never called by its name at night, because it would hear. It was called a string.”

— Chinua Achebe

142. “After a war life catches desperately at passing hints of normalcy like vines entwining a hollow twig.”

— Chinua Achebe

143. “And how is my daughter, Ezinma?” “She has been very well for some time now. Perhaps she has come to stay.” “I think she has. How old is she now?” “She is about ten years old.” “I think she will stay. They usually stay if they do not die before the age of six.” “I pray she stays,” said Ekwefi with a heavy sigh. The.”

— Chinua Achebe

144. “Nigeria has had a complicated colonial history. My work has examined that part of our story extensively.”

— Chinua Achebe

145. “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.”

— Chinua Achebe

146. “When we hear a house has fallen do we ask if the ceiling fell with it?”

— Chinua Achebe

147. “The air, which had been stretched taut with excitement, relaxed again.”

— Chinua Achebe

148. “The writer cannot expect to be excused from the task of reeducation and regeneration that must be done. In fact, he should march right in front.”

— Chinua Achebe

149. “When there is a big tree small ones climb on its back to reach the sun.”

— Chinua Achebe

150. “We do not seek to hurt any man, but if any man seeks to hurt us may he break his neck.”

— Chinua Achebe