The Freedom Artist QUOTES

1 " A week later another woman did the same thing. She stripped naked and ran through the streets singing. But that day changed the history of the world. For the police chased after the woman, caught up with her and, in full public view, ate her raw. They tore her flesh and drank her blood and ate chunks of her buttocks and gorged themselves on her bones.

After that a new madness came among the people.

At night, in a restless neighborhood, someone might be heard screaming. Those who looked out of the window saw a white van appear outside the house. An hour later men in uniformed would be seen emerging from the house with blood on their faces and blood and gristle on their shirts as if they had been feasting on raw wild animals. The next day nothing but the cracked skull and long bones of the victim were seen in the bedroom.

A new stage in the elimination of undesirables had been reached. "

― Ben Okri , The Freedom Artist

3 " Naturally, the quality of language changed. Certain words became suspicious and vanished from public life. Words like 'hope', 'rights', 'truth'. Anyone heard uttering those words found empty spaces around them. It wasn't long before anyone using the word 'freedom' was suspected of harbouring dangerous intentions. "

― Ben Okri , The Freedom Artist

5 " No one in the house had seen books for generations. We didn't even know what they were. We'd only heard that they were poisonous and that they ruined the mind, and that no one was to have anything to do with them.". "

― Ben Okri , The Freedom Artist

7 " Her father's books were not read in a normal way. Some of them were read with the hands. Some were read by placing them at the centre of the forehead. One of the books could only be read with eyes closed. Another one could only be read in dreams, while the reader was asleep, with the book under the pillow.

There was a very special book of her father's which could only be read by the dead. It was placed in their coffins, over the heart.

There was one book that was only read by drinking. Water was poured on its waterproof pages and the water was drunk. The words filled out in the blood and heart and brains, till the reader became the words.

There was another special book that was read in the wind. The book was left dangling, the wind blew its pages, and the reader, with the light on their face, read the words which the wind dispersed. "

― Ben Okri , The Freedom Artist