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I did not do it because I wanted to one day have a book deal…I did it because I loved it, and I enjoyed it, and I did not know where it was going to take me. I did it out of love of the art.

— Imbolo Mbue

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Source: On why she wrote Behold the Dreamers in “Imbolo Mbue on Empathy and the Price of the American Dream” in Lit Hub (2017 Jun 1)
Source quality: Source identified Names the work or year, but without an exact location.

More by Imbolo Mbue

Anyone can go to the shop and buy anything and give to anyone, he told Liomi when the boy asked him for the umpteenth time why he couldn’t get even a little toy truck. The true measure of whether somebody really loves you, he lectured, is what they do for you with their hands and say to you with their mouth and think of you in their heart.

Behold the dreamers (2016)

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More quotes by Imbolo Mbue

Our people say no condition is permanent, Mr. Edwards. Good times must come to an end, just like bad times, whether we want it or not.

Behold the dreamers (2016)

Home will never go away Home will be here when you come back You may go to bring back fortune You may go to escape misfortune You may even go, just because you want to go But when you come back We hope you’ll come back Home will still be here.

Behold the dreamers (2016)

People in this country, always worrying about how to eat, they pay someone good money to tell them: Eat this, don’t eat that. If you don’t know how to eat, what else can you know how to do in this world?

Behold the dreamers (2016)

But the Universe gives us different sources of Love to unite us all as One. Who are we to decide what the source of our Love should be at any given time? Love is Love, and at any given point we have everything we need.

Behold the dreamers (2016)

It's so hard to be a stranger in a strange land. I don't think most people understand how difficult it is to leave behind what you know and come to a country where everything about you is considered "different."

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Imbolo Mbue (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.