YouSaid · the spoken record

Wole Soyinka

lines on the record: 52
first: 2021-12-03
most recent: 2021-12-03
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Tightly structured as a play, as theatre. I needed, shall we say, quote unquote a cast of thousands. And that's why I found that I return intuitively. I didn't even think about twice about it. I just knew that this had to be a novel.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I've answered that question several times. That is a good question, but the basic answer is to begin by recognizing the fact that I don't consider myself a novelist. I don't consider myself a fiction writer. The theatre is my anlemics, of course, in poetry, etc. All the themes in this work have been addressed in various genres, including poetry. But so much and loose ends and loose ends which are becoming even gangrene, you know, they've been exposed to so much rot, they become gangrene. And so this, what had been, required a totally different discursive platform in which various characters can go different ways, be pulled back, something not so...”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, no, no. Almost simultaneous. Sorry, my memory. Well, anyway, I'd written the book before the announcement was made, but the book had not been published by then, and written it because I knew what would happen. So a whole year of celebrations. So when the book came out, I said to myself, hmm, you know, you're something of a prophet. And I know for a fact that it's as a result of that book, of that coming at that action that the celebration agenda was quietly shelved. I don't think beyond the usual parade and award of some honor here and there, I don't think anybody even smelled what was supposed to have been a year-long celebration. So you see, sometimes, just from time to time, we, the literatures, can claim a tiny... Bit of victory.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The culture of celebration of Nigerians, especially when there's nothing to celebrate, when in fact we should be in mourning. Now, when I wrote this book, the preliminary publication was in Northern Nigerian edition and actually worked very closely with my publisher and frenetically because I said to him, I want this work to be published on the day of the Nigerian 60th anniversary of independence. I said, this is my response to any thinking of a celebrated mode. And as if this was, as if the book had been read before the book came out, the government had announced a year's Celebration.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I'm going to leave that to critics and consumers to decide. Let's just say that for me, Triture is just another instrument of social and human engagement, community engagement. Literature is also sometimes an act of frustration that you cannot affect in other ways in the ways in which you would like to, the way in which I really would like to tackle humanity right now, my immediate humanity, my immediate constituency would probably have me at the Hague for crimes against humanity. So literature is also an expression of frustration, of being unable to treat your humanity sometimes the way they really deserve, but it's also a program. It's an expression of hope. The further one can still put pen to paper and even express the impossible is an act of optimism. So let's not be too romantic about literature. At the same time, let's not”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Referred to and related to whatever circumstances. Not just as a work of vision, but very directly related to what can be done to adjust inequities or irregularities within nation. Let's not fool ourselves. Writers, poets are not really the unacknowledged quote unquote legislators of the world. But sometimes they prove to be, never forget that. And I can cite numerous examples where we don't want to waste too much time.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Or the other in nation formulation. So it's very much like the state work in progress and they can influence each other. I sometimes use the analogy of the bureaucratic desk where you have a tray which says in and a tray which is out. And then in the middle there is one which is keep in view. I don't know whether they still have those, but we used to have them in Aguin offices. Keep in view. And so literature is very much like that. No matter how ancient, no matter how seemingly, how seemingly antiquated, no matter how ideologically neutral or ideologically saturated to the point of agit prop and propaganda, literature is something to be kept in view constantly.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Where literature as an occupation of call is a work in progress. Once you're done with Chronicles, it's too late. There's nothing else you can do except try and propagate what is inside in other ways. So it's a continuum, it's a work in progress in that session. A nation, however, is very much a work in progress. I don't care what they are talking about, the so-called developed states, the Scandinavian countries, China is very much a work in progress. The United States If it didn't know it before when Trump came on the scene, I hope United States now realizes that it's still a work in progress. So the two in many ways are very much alive. And if you take any work of literature, you can virtually open any page and there's something in there that can be used one way.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, you have to raise. I'm willing to expend this because that's all I can spare. But the rest has got to be legwork, heavy work. You ready to do it? You stay. Otherwise, please go to the existing parties. So that's one way to go about it. There'll be other ways, but that's all I can offer you as advice.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Was distribution of cash. I didn't see that problem. At least that wasn't what I saw to begin with, the draft which I gave them. And so one person actually came with two bodyguards to come and carry cash to go back to his constituency. That was the day when I said, oh, wait a minute, this thing has got to be tackled a different way. First, you've got to change people's orientation. I mean, this somebody totally new to the party and it comes with two bodyguards to carry away cash because it were made to believe that the purpose of the meeting was to distribute cash. My contribution to the purse, which I told them was all I had, I think was less than about $500. Because I said, that's all I have.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It needn't be a level of expectations. Let me quickly tell you an amazing chastening story about when I tried to gather the young people together and also some technocrats and professionals to form a political party. And things were going on quite well, not for myself. Just to give them a platform using my name and my, you know, whatever little clout I had. The day I moved out, what happened was this when I said, over to you, it's all yours. I'm out. At a meeting, some people came, they came from the east, they came from the north, and we thought we had a good gathering. Until I discovered that one item on the agenda, on the program which somebody had put there, because that's what he believed. And he was actually in the executive.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Before Obama became president, I watched. I was teaching all over universities in the United States and I saw the transformation of thinking. I saw what the youths did, how they converted their parents, how their parents then became mechanisms for converting their friends. I saw students sleeping on the floor in makeshift offices for the Obama campaign. And I said to people, we are watching a transformation in thinking of a once-slaving”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Is one way of going about it. It requires, as I told some of my acolytes when we once tried to start a political party, I said, you will ride bicycles. You will ride horses. You will ride donkeys. You will walk. You cannot just stay in one place and think that by going on the radio from time to time or intervening in some public event from time to time, you will make it. You will transform that society through actually political power. You have to walk. Others have a war chest which you cannot beat. And so you've got to find other methods. You've got to go to the marketplaces. You've got to talk to parents. I mean, we saw what happened at the United States.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“All right. My answer to that, it will be from example. I met President Lula, ex-President Lula of Brazil when he came to Nigeria once. In fact, invited me to have a chat with him at his hotel where I was staying. We had a very long chat. And I asked him the question, how did he do it? It was a trade unionist. It was a virtual unknown. And he said, what I did was I printed lots and lots of leaflets and I stood at street corners and I would distribute the leaflets to motorists, to workers going to work, markets, et cetera. My name is Lula. This is my manifesto. I want to become the next president of this nation.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, my positive answer to that is what is wrong with a variegated nation? What is wrong with that? To be able to move from Shiv culture to Yoruba culture to Shakiri culture to Bia Ibu culture to Fulani culture, what greater gift could one have? Two people were genuinely creative and who are constantly looking for the very nation of existence to be productive. Culture is not just the humanities. Culture is also physical, material, productivity, whether you're talking about agriculture systems, etc. So nothing wrong, basically. But where something is not clearly not working, where humanity is not being served, I go back on my record of saying by slogan, let nations die, that humanity may survive.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I know, for instance, associations of doctors who come home every year, if only for one month, operating or emergency operations all over the country. And then they go back and so on. So by keeping that contact, studying the weak points of the state, assessing the strengths of the state and knowing where to strike effectively, creatively and collectively at the right moments, I think they will begin to recover that nation for themselves, for their own future, which is what we're talking about.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Together or physically, I made that mistake before in which I've enticed people back. Said, come back, you know, uproot, just come. Let's build it together. They came within weeks. They'd had it, and they went back. And some of them turned their backs on Nigeria permanently. But there are those who continue to live, to exist, to create and be productive, one leg outside, one leg in. These ones were in fact the spearheads of Ensal's movement, very much so. Collecting money, creating networks, integrating themselves as far as possible within the creative structure, within the nation, the unofficial or even the official, the state or non-state, whatever form. It takes various forms.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They ask the question you ask what should we do we who never do not belong to a generation that had experienced, as we say in Nigeria, better say, what do we do? Well, my answer is just organize. Organize again, reorganize along the lines of NSARS. This time, profit from the lessons of certain loopholes which had been left in the organizing. I think they underestimated also the deviousness of state and its capacity to infiltrate. I think this should be corrected, but above all, I hesitate to say this. Those who are outside, return. Now, I don't say return altogether.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Of slavery to a wasted generation and to their whims and their own priorities. So it was a great movement, no question at all about that. Unfortunately, it was betrayed. It was betrayed also by infiltration, by state agencies, but ultimately it has betrayed by the people themselves. They allow themselves to be bought. And in any case, it was an opportunity for them to manifest their own proclivities for chaos, for opportunism, for predatoriness. They turned predatory on themselves, on one another, and they destroyed, or at least emasculated that movement.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The two questions there are rightly joined, I think. ENSA's was the beginning of hope, or shall we say a renewal of hope. I saw the young generation finally doing what they're supposed to be doing for decades, not sitting down and being crybabies and whining or and or saying, let's join them. We can beat them. Let's join them. Let's get a slice of the action no matter what course it is. We actually saw the young generation taking their destiny in their own hands and at great cost. It was evidence of their capacity to organize a recognition of a watershed in their lives and a seizure of a moment at a critical moment when to wait any longer would have been to admit, to accept his status.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Proceeding which does not say that we are subhuman when we see examples in other societies, whether call it the Soviet Union, call it within Africa, Eritrea, Ethiopia, call it Britain, where till tomorrow the Scottish are still asking for their own independence, the Irish have not given them up. And so who are we to say, let us kill one another simply because one section says we want to leave? I don't accept that. And when I hear language like I give my blood to keep Nigeria together and I'm ready to spill it again, I say, go and spill it in your village. Don't bring it to the national desk. We must speak as equal human beings, as equal communities, and stop pretending there's something special. About us or about any section of our society. So I forgot what started this federation. But anyway, I hope I give you the answer.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Be distrust and anonymity between the various parts of the nation. We need to go back to the drawing board. We need to go back to how we became a nation in the first place, to ask whose will we are maintaining, sustaining by remaining one nation or whose will we are about to execute by pulling apart in multiple directions. I just like a rational proceeding. That's all. One that begins with the right to self-determination of any people anywhere in the world.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We must continue to fight for what we believed in, but we must also leave open the possibilities of other means of achieving the same targets on behalf of our people, correct, or for me my position regarding nations is very clear. I made it clear very often, people have a right anytime to say we want our own autonomy. We believe that we're being impeded. Our progress is being impeded by belonging to this larger community, but they must argue their case and proceed with that in a way that does not make us repeat the errors of the war that we underwent, which cost us about a modest estimate, 2 million plus people, which has created till today.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Absolutely right effort of Biafrans to reintegrate themselves into society, into the Lida society, or their choice, to move out. For me, there's nothing wrong with either side, with either position, as long as there's a kind of logic to it, to be able to say, listen, what we fought for at the time. Still with us”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“What led to the Biafran War and how that war has left its impact on the present. There's a failure to see a relationship. And I say this not merely in relation to the Federal side, but even to the Biafran side, on the Biafran side, for instance, there are many who have picked up the wrong lessons from the war itself and who refuse, who deliberately refused to accept some of the lead up events to the Biafran War. This has nothing to do with whether you are a pro-Biafran or a pro-Federalist. No, no, no. I'm talking about, for instance, the consequences of the war and also the very”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, and this from you put your finger on something else. I've said it again and again. There's something peculiar about Nigeria in relation to memory. It's as if memory is a kind of disjunction. Let me reveal to you, for instance, that my first collection of essays came out eventually under a different title was, I think it was memory and amnesia, which could be an encapsulation of the dilemma of Nigerian society. People refer occasionally to the Diafran War, for instance. But there's a failure to connect.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Cut a wall. And this has become a continuous thing. It's no longer an aberration, an incident here that make people shudder and stay home for a couple of days. No, everybody now is endangered. If you all wanted, I could go into recent cases of killings, ritual killings with the corpse that have been found disemboweled by the loggers. This did not happen when I was growing up. And I find it impossible. Accept. So, this was what I was born into to be part of such a community. That is the problem.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Rest of the quote unquote minority which are being heard. And you feel from time to time that you cannot leave this collective heritage to the barbarians, to the cynics, the manipulators, the opportunists, you know, those who absolutely are so solipsistic that they see the nation only as a reflection of themselves, of their own personal property, who totally lack scruples who do not hesitate. And this applies to those who are not even in government, who do not hesitate to butcher other beings or to even hand over, betray their fellow beings among the hoi poloi simply in order to make rituals to enrich themselves. This is for me the unkindest.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The other was, oh, both of them were my personal friends. The other was Bolaige. It was not just a politician, but it was the Nation's Attorney General and Minister of Justice. And he was cut down in cold blood in his own bedroom after his security detail was just maneuvered out of his own. And then he was just gunned down until today. till today those remain among the hundreds of unsolved political murders. So I think it's that sense of being made aware periodically, continuously also, that you're not really alone, even if it appears that it's just yours and the voices of”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They speak to me. I'm almost like a Farrakhan fet to many of them. So, yes, I think it is that which actually nerves one to continue, that you feel you cannot let them down if you cannot abandon them. And that applies also to a number of others, some of them even journalists who relate to them perhaps even more closely than I do. You'll notice, and then some of them, as I said, are even among the state. There are agents of the state. The whole position in the state. It's one of the reasons why dedicated the work to two people at least, one of whom was an investigative reporter who was blown up delega.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I think one of the ways in which one can keep one's quote unquote faith, at least in one's beliefs, is by focusing from time to time on the positive majority. Not just the minority. We seem to be a minority because it's always a minority whose voices are often heard. But if you move in the marketplaces, in the factories, in the streets, you know that the majority actually do not accept the situation. Their relationship with you, the way they talk to you, the way they treat you, even when they're in the security services, some of us, I'll tell you frankly, all are very alive to those in the security agencies who were sent to eliminate. Take whatever period you want. Our friends within the military, not just friends, but very close admirers are friends within the police, the various arms of the secret service. They come to me.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But when you use religion to subvert the rights of others, even to the extent of claiming the right to kill and not just singly, but collectively to burn down the places of worship others in the memory or religion, then it's about time we treated religion as a crime against humanity. It's reached that level in societies like Nigeria.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And then you say that it was caused by supernatural forces where you know very well that you flouted the conditions for increasing the floors of your building. So this is what has become the daily reality of Nigeria. And so religion has got to be put in its place in order for people to be liberated as rational beings, beings of volition, who can tackle the problems of existence in a rational collective way rather than by insisting that it's only along one route that society can be transformed, take your religion, practice it at home, collect around you, anybody you want for collective celebrations of a religious”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And indulge in cross-border child trafficking, celebrating child marriage, consuming, I beg your pardon, that event which is against the law of the nation and he sails he has the right to do it because his religion permits it, then both he and that religion should just be shown the way to the law courts and treated just like other phenomena of society and other individuals of society. If you can use religion to excuse building a church which collapses on the heads of humanity, many of them, in fact not from Nigeria, several from South Africa. I'm talking about this tabernacle of the late, what's his name, Joshua, whatever.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Until that is done, people will always find there's something extra by belonging and being and manifesting even to an extreme extent your religious adhesions. Religion has become the number one problem for Nigerians. Hope is all very well, but hope itself can become putrid, especially if it's hope for unearned advantages in society if religion becomes an excuse for flouting the law, then that religion has got to be tackled head on. If, for instance, a legislator, and I've used this example so often, I'm tired of it, but I will continue to use it. If a legislator later a governor can claim the right to be a pedophile,”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Whose slices of lips, noses for those who do not accept his own brand of Christianity? I don't even know what's happened to him. Has it been captured? Has he been bitten to death by a snake in one of those jungles over there? It saved humanity the trouble of tracking him down, but all over the place. That's really what I'm getting at. All over the place, I find that religion has been cough-setted too much and liberties have been taken by religionists which would not be considered to other movements which are considered secularist. It's a safe moment you put on a garb of religious leader. You can close up the expressway between Lagos and the rest of the nation simply because you're having a religious celebration. You're just a fraction of the rest of the nation and you should be accorded no special privileges.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Not merely spiritual liberation, but physical, social, economic liberation. You look at what the religion did for the blacks in prisons in America, United States, who found such strength in the nation of Islam and turned their back on other religions like Christianity and became, found, recovered their dignity through that religion, Islam, which however is being totally degraded, debased and discredited by extreme occultic, almost cultic variations of that religion. And you find the same thing in Christianity. Look at Joseph Coney, that barbarian who captures children, nor totally turns them against even the basic values in which they've been brought.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, first of all, I've been accused quite rightly of being against religion. I have developed a great antipathy that the confessor right away to religion. And yet, at the same time, I should be at least credited on record as admitting the fact that religion has played a very positive role in the lives of many communities, many societies. A country like the United States and the condition of slaves in the total degradation of their humanity is very often religion which give them the hope, that word, the confidence that sooner or later, if only they hung on to this thread of the supernatural, that they also will experience liberation.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Is beyond the capacity of one government assailed from all sectors by this pernicious development. It's not only Nigeria that is going on, but we are at the center of this abominable development. So the issue of what is nation has become paramount in my thinking. What I don't even want to hear the expression national sovereignty anymore. I don't want to hear the expression national integrity anymore. If you cannot ensure the dignity of your people, especially the most vulnerable section. So you're quite right. There are issues which go to the very basis of what is human, what is human today.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“In Libya, markets are there on officials have been there to rescue, etc., etc. But what pains want? Most deeply today is the vulnerable section of society which is being targeted. I mean, and we continue to talk about national sovereignty, and we know that we have contributed troops to peacekeeping all over the world. And why can we not demand”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We don't compel them to go on raids where they can get killed and captured and enslaved in turn. No, they just mobilize. Go to the nearest school, capture hundreds of children, take them into the forest, and then tell the government, their parents, institutions to which they belong, come and negotiate for their ransom. I mean, what difference is there between that? And those centuries of slavery across slave trade, I beg your pardon, across the Sahara, across the Atlantic, and today, when hordes in the name of whatever religion are simply starkly for money, are capturing our children, enslaving them, and selling them, selling some of them into sex markets and others into slave markets.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Sit, continue to parrot this notion of national sovereignty. We will not accept any encroachment on our national integrity. What integrity if you're losing your humanity? You are absolutely being subsumed under activities which go against the entire family of nations to which you belong. This is why some of us have been demanding, not only from our nation, but from outside governments, international intervention for this new slavery beamed directly at the most vulnerable sections of the nation in which children have been sent to school and then they are kidnapped by this new generation of slavers. We're even making the work easy for them.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Stewards, unexpectations from the rest of the world, the rest of other nations. The United Nations, for instance, to which we subscribe in the United Nations, even before the United Nations, different nations woke up various degrees of development and ask themselves, wait a minute, what is slavery, what is enslavement? Why are we permitting this dehumanization? And the high abolition movement springing up all over the world until the moment when anti-slavery protocols are enshrined in the United Nations of belonging. And yet today what attempt a resurrection of enslavement of the slave trade is taking place.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's reached the point for, and this is a very long time ago, but now it's, shall we say, it peaked condition, an internal condition, also externally expressed a number of times, in which one asks the question, just what is a nation, when is a nation? What is it exactly? What are we talking about? If a nation finds that its future is being targeted, you know, by, for instance, your automation, the kidnapping of school children for ransom what are termed a new slave trade internally and externally. People permit themselves to reach that state of abomination, then what are we talking about in terms of a nation? And also, what is the relationship, both the obligation?”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They even think of inflicting on the state. This has gone beyond that. It's reached a level where I believe the people themselves should begin to ask questions and demand very rigorous answers beyond rhetoric. Action, saying, wait a minute, wait a minute, this is not we, the adults. This is not what we grew up with. This is not the norm. This is not even the lowest acceptable level of negative norm that we underwent. And to say why are children being turned into pawns of bale, etc., etc., etc. So you're absolutely right. It has been on my mind for decades.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Two expressions from you, which spot on. One is that being on your mind for some time. But the nature of the violence, you're absolutely right, has been mutated into almost one could even speak about the mutation of humanity itself and also the ability to continue to absorb this level of mutation, this failure to demonstrate not merely by words but by action that this has gone beyond what you might call the acceptable level of violence, especially among the people themselves. I mean, we've gone beyond Fanon's well-observed theory of the violence of the oppressed, that very often the oppressed turn inwards into themselves and inflict greater violence on their own kind than the”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So it is possible that it is not such a virtuous tolerant and temperament that made these politicians patronized, or at least accept the book. But I think for the first time, maybe they see themselves as part of the rest of the populace and the populace as simply being an extension of themselves. I suspect that they are happy that the people who criticize them normally also getting it in the neck. Because I hope I succeeded, I think I did, in addressing us, myself included among the rest, saying that listen, look at what you've become. Look at what you've allowed yourself to become. Look at what you've accepted. You're now accepting the norm. So it could also be part of that. But finally, as a writer, I hope the simply think it's a good read, but that's flattering myself.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Let me tell you a suspicion that came to me quite recently, not from the very beginning. Omit a section of the nation, of the populace. I believe, I hope I addressed successfully, and that's the people themselves. What they have allowed themselves to become”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“One of the most, shall we say, salubrious characters in the play. And he said, Oh, I know, I know that, I know that. But I still want to ask my question. I didn't quite receive an answer earlier. I will chatted for quite a while. And I know that a number of them have bought several copies for their friends which they've distributed. And in fact, one has made it a policy of making it part of his, he works for the government as a politician and he's made it a point of beauty of placing it in the, you know, we have this distribution, what do you call them, bumper, baskets or hampers, you know, putting this a copy of this book in his cabinet hamper. Now, that really is, I think, something to crow about.”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's been quite a bit of a surprise, a pleasant one for me, by the way, that some of the greatest enthusiasts of this work have been politicians, believe it or not, including, let me emphasize, one or two who understand, accept the fact that they have formed a basis of a couple of the characters in the novel. I can tell you, for instance, that when we launched the work in Abuja, the capital, there were a couple of politicians there who recognized themselves in it. One of them had been asked questions from the floor, and then came up afterwards. They came up to me, I said, before you say anything, I hope you're aware that I based this particular character on you, and it's not a...”
2021-12-03 · Intelligence Squared · Wole Soyinka on writing, politics and the power of a novel · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT