Miriam Makeba Quotes

Before adolescence, memory is more interested in the future than the past...

African music, though very old, is always being rediscovered in the West.

But what's the alternative? What's the alternative to pumping out a unit every nine months? Pointless careerism? Pointless careerism, putting on a man tailored suit and shoulder pads and imitating all the worst behavior of men? Is this the noblest thing that women can think of?

The tragedy of civil wars in countries like Angola and Mozambique is that they left many civilians maimed. Poverty is the reason HIV/AIDS spread so rapidly in the African townships and slums. Poverty is the real killer.

Nothing is more unbearable, once one has it, than freedom.

Much has been written of love turning to hatred, of the heart growing cold with the death of love. It is a remarkable process. It is far more terrible than anything I have ever read about it, more terrible than anything I will ever be able to say.

? my unhealthy timidity might be a great obstacle to me in my life.

I must learn to brook being happier than I deserve.

Move from apathy to action. Aim at becoming better than me. Luck will favour those who are prepared

I was born in a poor country. I was poor, but I lived all my life with what I had. I didn’t spend more than I had. Cape Verde is not the only place where there are poor people

Nothing is more important than empathy for another human being’s suffering. Nothing — not a career, not wealth, not intelligence, certainly not status. We have to feel for one another if we’re going to survive with dignity.

But people can't, unhappily, invent their mooring posts, their lovers and their friends, anymore than they can invent their parents. Life gives these and also takes them away and the great difficulty is to say Yes to life.

One ought not to be unkind to a woman merely on account of her plainness, any more than one had a right to take liberties with her merely because she was handsome.

Don't gain the world and lose your soul
Wisdom is better than silver and gold.

Fewer people are bent from hard work than are crooked from avoiding it.

Success is more a function of consistent common sense than it is of genius.