Adania Shibli Quotes

The oppressor wants first to destroy your wish to live, and then you neutralize it by acting as if this is normal. But then you keep a secret hidden zone that the oppressor finds so minor that they wouldn’t bother to destroy.

I only write fiction in Arabic because this language is a witch—an amazing, funny, crazy, generous, and forgiving witch. It has allowed me everything. It is the space of the most intimate freedom I have ever experienced in my life.

this landscape has an alliance with language; they exist together and actually can haunt you, despite any attempt at their erasure.

I always find a place with words to create parallel possibilities where dehumanization thrives. However, in real life, you need to neutralize all your emotions and become numb, but then writing neutralizes that neutralization. Other people don’t have words for their rescue. But something else, a walk, a pavement, a tree, a stone, endless minor objects that turn into the place where they practice their humanity, a place where oppression cannot reach or destroy.

Differences between people are used to commit injustice—that was an early lesson about racism.