Binyavanga Wainaina
1971 - 2019
5
Quotes
Biography
Binyavanga Wainaina was a Kenyan author, journalist, and LGBTQ rights activist. He gained international acclaim for his satirical essay 'How to Write About Africa' and won the Caine Prize for African Writing in 2002. Wainaina founded the literary magazine Kwani? and was a vocal advocate for African literature and queer rights. He bravely came out as gay in a 2014 essay titled 'I am a homosexual, mum'. His writing often addressed themes of identity, politics, and culture in Africa.
Famous Quotes (5)
1
I want to meet a hundred people a day. I want to have my face out there. That’s what one owes society. I am not excited to have to sell my face in my own country. I’m not excited to have to confound your easy stereotypes.
2
I want Aids to be finished. I am tired and my friends are tired. We want our lives back. We want to live again, whole, whole lives.
3
We repeat the tired narrative about Nairobi being this place of safety and creative haven. Maybe it is. But my life is not so. I live in a state of siege these days. I feel hunted by the state. I feel hampered by the state.
4
We are so funereal. You look happy now. How wonderful for you. I look forward to seeing you defeated again, and soon. Here lies a nation. Here are its people. Here is the sad reality led by cows and herds.
5
It is mercy, deliverance. Farewell, intercourse. Welcome, self-pity, in earnest, absolute. I never glory in this joyous work. It is sad.