Quotes for Friday from Wole Soyinka's Death and the King's Horseman (II)
Continuation from last weeks quotes cum proverbs.
[W]hen the elephant heads for the jungle, the tail is too small a handhold for the hunter that would pull him back.
The sun that heads for the sea no longer heeds the prayers of the farmer.
When the river begins to taste the salt of the ocean, we no longer know what deity to call on, the river-god or Olokun.
No arrow flies back to the string, the child does not return through the same passage that gave it birth.
A dog does not outrun the hand that feeds it meat.
A horse that throws its rider slows down to a stop.
The river is never so hight that the eyes of a fish are covered.
The night is not so dark that the albino fails to find his way.
It is the death of war that kills the valiant, death of water is how the swimmer goes, it is the death of markets that kills the trader and death of indecision takes the idle away. The trade of the cutlass blunts its edge and the beautiful die the death of beauty.
What we have no intention of eating should not be held to the nose.
The river which fills up before our eyes does not sweep us away in its flood.
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I like the one about the child returning up the passage from where it was born!
ReplyDeleteI laughed at it.
ReplyDelete