Ousmane Sembène > Quotes

“Real misfortune is not just a matter of being hungry and thirsty; it is a matter of knowing that there are people who want you to be hungry and thirsty”
― Ousmane Sembène, God's Bits of Wood

“However long it stays in the river the tree-trunk will never turn into a crocodile.”
― Ousmane Sembène, Xala

“At the moment the eyes of the body closed, the eyes of the mind were opened.”
― Ousmane Sembène, God's bits of wood

“Ever since they left Thies, the women had not stopped singing. As soon as one group allowed the refrain to die, another picked it up, and new verses were born at the hazard of chance or inspiration, one word leading to another and each finding, in its turn, its rhythm and its place. No one was very sure any longer where the song began, or if it had an ending. It rolled out over its own length, like the movement of a serpent. It was as long as a life.”
― Ousmane Sembène, God's Bits of Wood

“Let's be very clear. Europe is not my center, Europe is on the outskirts. After one hundred years here, did they speak my language? I speak theirs. My future does not depend on Europe, I'd like them to understand me but it makes no difference. Take the map of Africa, place Europe and America together and there's still room left. Why be a sunflower and turn toward the sun? I myself am the sun!”
― Ousmane Sembène

“A cool breeze laden with iodine blew in from the sea.”
― Ousmane Sembène, Xala

“If a man like that is killed, there is always another to take his place. That is not the important thing. But to act so that no man dares to strike you because he knows you speak the truth, to act so that you can no longer be arrested because you are asking for the right to live, to act so that all of this will end, both here and elsewhere; that is what should be in your thoughts. That is what you must explain to others, so that you will never again be forced to bow down before anyone, but also so that no one shall be forced to bow down before you. It was to tell you this that I asked you to come, because hatred must not dwell with you.”
― Ousmane Sembène, God's Bits of Wood

“The development of Africa will not happen without the effective participation of women. Our forefathers’ image of women must be buried once for all.”
― Ousmane Sembène

“Grandfather, I know now what it is that washes the water. It is the spirit. The water is clear and pure, but the spirit is purer still.”
― Ousmane Sembène, God's Bits of Wood

“It isn't those who are taken by force, put in chains, and sold as slaves who are the real slaves; it is those who will accept it, morally and physically.”
― Ousmane Sembène

“Maimouna was blind, but this is not to say that she was pitiable. Far from it. She held her splendid, smooth skinned body like some goddess of the night, her head high, her vacant glance seeming to contemplate an area above people, above the world.”
― Sembène Ousmane

“Je préfère devenir aveugle, être brûlée dans un incendie ou mourir par petits morceaux que d'adresser la parole à ce bouc. Ce que j'ai fait à son Vendredi, je suis prête à le refaire. Ces gens-là ne sont ni des parents, ni des amis, ils sont prêts à lécher le derrière des toubabs pour avoir des médailles, tout le monde le sait. Ne pleure plus, lève-toi, on s'en va. Moi j'ai assez vu leurs figures!”
― Ousmane Sembène

“A few nights before, sleepless and a prey to the constant nagging of hunger, he had been huddled in his bed, and a kind of prayer had formed within him "Lord," he had said, oh Lord who loves me. I am alone on the only road I know Having suffered as much as I have, I am still at the beginning of suffering, Does this mean that I am damned? Lord, what are you doing for me? You do not prevent the wicked from doing as they will, nor the good from being crushed beneath the weight of their misery and by Your commandments you stay the arm of the just man when he would lift it to repair the evil. Do you really exist, or are you just an image? I don't see that you show yourself anywhere, Lord, You are a God of goodness, and You have given me Your grace. Is it I who have failed? Forgive me, and help me, Lord, Lord who loves me, for I am worthy of your help.”
― Sembène Ousmane

“For a moment, the passage of the locomotive would calm the torment in their hearts, because their fellowship with the machine was deep and strong; stronger than the barriers which separated them for their employers, stronger even than the obstacle which until now had been insurmountable--the color of their skin”
― Ousmane Sembène, God's Bits of Wood

“And so the strike came to Theis. An unlimited strike which for many along the whole length of the railroad, was a time for suffering, but for many was a time for thought. When the smoke from the trains no longer drifted from the savanna, they realize that an age had ended--an age their elders had told them about, when all of Africa was just a garden for food. Now the machines ruled over their lands, and when they forced every machine within a thousand miles to halt they became conscious of their strength, but also of their dependence. They began to understand that the machine was making them a whole new breed of men. It did not belong to them; it was they who belonged to it.”
― Ousmane Sembène