Author

Every human being has a bit of gangster in him.

There is no country in the world with the diversity, confidence and talent and black pride like Nigeria.

Every one, we, we homosexuals, are people, and we need our oxygen to breathe.

There's no point for me in being a writer and having all these blocked places where I feel I can't think freely and imagine freely. There just really is no point.

From Binyavanga Wainaina

I believe in, and will to the best of my ability fight for, equal rights and freedom of opinion for everyone, regardless of colour, religion, nationality, orientation - you know the rest.

From Binyavanga Wainaina

I knew I didn't want to come out in the 'New Yorker'; it just felt wrong. It needed an African conversation.

From Binyavanga Wainaina

Never have a picture of a well-adjusted African on the cover of your book, or in it, unless that African has won the Nobel prize.

From Binyavanga Wainaina

In kindergarten, we had this Irish Catholic headmistress called Sister Leonie, and I remember she would tell us, say, to put the crayons in the box. I remember thinking, 'Why is everyone finding this so easy? Why should the crayons be in the box?'

From Binyavanga Wainaina

It's like I was always not quite sure even how to move in space somehow; I would watch people and then copy them. I found it really hard to walk straight. My brother was always on at me for walking off the pavement. I guess I always expected people to bring me back into line.

From Binyavanga Wainaina

When I went to live in South Africa, I immediately began to understand what went wrong. Because here was a place supposed to be under apartheid - I arrived there in 1991 - but here a black person had more say and had more influence over his white government than an average Kenyan had over the Moi government.

From Binyavanga Wainaina

Binyavanga Wainaina

Notable Quotes

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