Wole Soyinka Quotes
All religions accept that there is something called 'criminality.' And criminality cannot be excused by religious fervour.
Soyinka, Wole. Interview. BBC News, 2012.
This verse has been one of the bases of Muslim theocratic states like Iran’s claim to legitimacy. The word “govern” is sometimes translated as “judge.” In the context of the 6th century, there were no separation of powers as we know them and judging, governing and legislating were melded.
This quotation is important for two reasons. First, it shows how important the clergy of the nation were in calling for the passage of the bill. Second, it illustrates the total blind spot that Southern leaders had on the Segregation issue. It never occurred to Russell and many other Southerners that discrimination and denial of civil rights WAS a moral issue. They saw it purely as political.
Akinwande Oluwole Babatunde Soyinka, known as Wole Soyinka (pronounced [wɔlé ʃójĩnká]), is a Nigerian playwright, novelist, poet, and essayist in the English language. He was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature, the first sub-Saharan African to be honoured in that category. Soyinka was born into a Yoruba family in Abeokuta. In 1954, he attended Government College in Ibadan, and subsequently University College Ibadan and the University of Leeds in England. After studying in Nigeria and the UK, he worked with the Royal Court Theatre in London. He went on to write plays that were produced in both countries, in theatres and on radio. He took an active role in Nigeria's political history and its struggle for independence from Great Britain. In 1965, he seized the Western Nigeria Broadcasting Service studio and broadcast a demand for the cancellation of the Western Nigeria Regional Elections. In 1967, during the Nigerian Civil War, he was arrested by the federal government of General Yakubu Gowon and put in solitary confinement for two years.
