Home > Author > Namwali Serpell
1 " Only a sister, an alternative self, could inspire such a sordid mix of disgust and envy. "
― Namwali Serpell , The Old Drift
2 " Ding. The cabin lights came on...The flight attendants paced the aisles like antic tightrope walkers, with fixed smiles and mussed make-up. They were done with coddling. They snatched Naila's blankets and demanded her headset, they claimed her rubbish and chastised her tilted seat. "
3 " During his time at university, Ronald had learned that 'history' was the word the English used for the record of every time a white man encountered something he had never seen and promptly claimed it as his own, often renaming it for good measure. History, in short, was the annals of the bully on the playground. "
4 " Matha had never considered that being female would thwart her so, that it would be a hurdle she had to jump every time she wanted to learn something: to read a book, to shout the answers, to make a bomb, to love a man, to fight for freedom. "
5 " She had never imagined that to be a woman was always, somehow, to be a banishable witch. "
6 " No grass back there, just concrete with cracks so big, your mama’s back stayed broke. "
― Namwali Serpell , Will Williams
7 " Face all bittered up ’cause he had bad knees and we didn’t. "
8 " Every family is a war but some are more civil than others. "
9 " She stepped from the trashy bedlam of the road into the cool cave of the shop, relieved to escape the experience of walking outside while female. "
10 " Progress is just the word we use to disguise power doing its thing. "
11 " The Civil Rights Movement in the US was all about logjams and blockades. Martin Luther King is the one who said “a riot is the language of the unheard”. And the decolonisation of our country wasn’t just boycotts and speeches. It was bombing bridges, too. "
12 " But really and truly the devil entered my life one day. You know, you look back on it. And you see that something stepped in. Right. There. "
13 " dwindle. Vultures! We started this nation with potential. “A society of the people!” Kaunda said. But somehow we narrowed until it was just for the top three per cent. The capitalists replaced the colonialists. And "
14 " She felt comfortable here, among the poor. She understood the constant complaining that surrounded them like the droning of insects. They were right: it was all just luck, just circumstance. "
15 " She woke up to her sister sitting across from her. "
16 " I want to tell them that our minds are free, even if our hand are tied by poverty. "
― Namwali Serpell
17 " Stephen Hawking once said, ‘Without imperfection, neither you nor I would exist.’ Every small stray opens up a new way, an Eden of forking digressions. "
18 " They were not kings. The empire was a frikkin sham. They were colonialists, and for that you only need brute force – nothing to boast of when you have it. Power’s just an accident that depends on the weakness of others. "
19 " Gloom everywhere. Gloom up the Potomac; where it rolls among meadows no longer green, and by splendid country seats. Gloom down the Potomac where it washes the sides of huge war-ships. Gloom on the marshes, the fields, and the heights. Gloom settling steadily down over the sumptuous habitations of the rich, and creeping through the cellars of the poor. Gloom arresting the steps of chance-office seekers, and bewildering the heads of grave and reverend Senators; for with fog, and drizzle, and a sleety driving mist the night has come at least two hours before its time. "
― Namwali Serpell , Stranger Faces (Undelivered Lectures)
20 " Old like her father was old, a shaggy shambling old, an old where you'd lost the order of things and felt so sad that you simply had to embrace the loss, reassuring yourself with the lie that you hadn't really wanted all that order to begin with. "
