Tahar Ben Jelloun

“Exile is a space where you are always a stranger.”

“Racism is a refuge for the ignorant. It seeks to divide and to destroy. It is the enemy of freedom, and deserves to be met with defiance.”

“Culture is what makes us what we are and not something else. It is the heart of our identity.”

“To write is to transform that which is hurting you, to make it somehow beautiful.”

“A library is a hospital for the mind.”

“A country without a memory is a country of madmen.”

“Memory is a strange thing, it doesn't work like I imagined. We don't control it. It controls us.”

“Solitude is not a curse, but a moment of grace to find oneself.”

“One does not write to be a writer, but to join the great family of those who have something to say.”

“Every language is a world. Without translation, we would inhabit parishes bordering on silence.”

“We don't choose our parents, or our ethnicity, or our nationality. We are what we are.”

“There is no truth. There is only perception.”

“Love is a fragile flame that one must protect from the winds of habit and routine.”

“The desert is a book where nothing is written. It is a pure space of freedom.”