Linton Kwesi Johnson Quotes

• Writing was a political act and poetry was a cultural weapon.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Writing, Poetry, Political

  "I did my own thing". Interview With Nicholas Wroe, www.theguardian.com. March 8, 2008.

  58 Copy quote

• I am often asked why I started to write poetry. The answer is that my motivation sprang from a visceral need to creatively articulate the experiences of the black youth of my generation, coming of age in a racist society.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Motivation, Writing, Black Youth

  "Trust between the police and the black community is still broken" by Linton Kwesi Johnson, www.theguardian.com. March 28, 2012.

  56 Copy quote

• At the end of the day, life's about realising one's human potential. I don't know if I've realised mine, but I've certainly gone a long way towards realising some goals and some dreams.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Dream, Long, Goal

  17 Copy quote

• That the language of the poetry of Jamaican music is rastafarian or biblical language cannot simply be put down to the colonizer and his satanic missionaries. The fact is that the historical experience of the black Jamaican is an experience of the most acute human suffering, desolation and despair in the cruel world that is the colonial world.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Biblical, Historical, Black

  13 Copy quote

• The more I read my poems, the more I find out about them. I still read them with the same passion I felt when I wrote them as a young man.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Passion, Men, Linton

  56 Copy quote

• I don't go to see bands any more because I've got tinnitus, so I have to avoid loud music. You get used to it, but when it's quiet you hear a constant ringing.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Band, Quiet, Used

  11 Copy quote

• Once you have a disease like cancer, you look at life a bit differently. Some things that were important no longer seem as important as they were.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Cancer, Important, Looks

  56 Copy quote

• I have never, ever sought validation from the arbiters of British poetic taste.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Validation, Taste, Poetic

  56 Copy quote

• ....the popular music of Jamaica, the music of the people, is an essentially experiential music, not merely in the sense that the people experience the music, but also in the sense that the music is true to the historical experience, that the music reflects the historical experience. It is the spiritual expression of the historical experience of the Afro-Jamaican.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Spiritual, Expression, Jamaica

  8 Copy quote

• I wrote two poems about the 81 uprisings: Di Great Insohreckshan and Mekin Histri. I wrote those two poems from the perspective of those who had taken part in the Brixton riots. The tone of the poem is celebratory because I wanted to capture the mood of exhilaration felt by black people at the time.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Taken, Uprising, Two

  "Trust between the police and the black community is still broken" by Linton Kwesi Johnson, www.theguardian.com. March 28, 2012.

  56 Copy quote

• Back in those early days when I began my apprenticeship as a poet, I also tried to voice our anger, spirit of defiance and resistance in a Jamaican poetic idiom.

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Voice, Resistance, Spirit

  "Trust between the police and the black community is still broken" by Linton Kwesi Johnson, www.theguardian.com.

  56 Copy quote

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