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writing“Reporterns nyfikenhet på världen är en fråga om karaktär. Det finns människor som inte intresserar sig för omvärlden. Den egna världen ser de som hela världen. Och det ska man inte säga något ont om.
Konfucius hävdade att världen lär man känna bäst om man inte går utanför sin dörr. Det ligger en viss sanning i det. Man behöver inte nödvändigtvis resa i rummet. Det går att färdas långt in i den egna själens djup. En resa är ett vidsträckt begrepp, mångfacetterat.
Men det finns människor som måste lära känna världen i hela dess mångfald - det är en del av deras natur. Sådana människor finns det inte många av.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “Reporterns självporträtt”
“Oil kindles extraordinary emotions and hopes, since oil is above all a great temptation. It is the temptation of ease, wealth, strength, fortune, power. It is a filthy, foul-smelling liquid that squirts obligingly up into the air and falls back to earth as a rustling shower of money. To discover and possess the source of oil is to feel as if, after wandering long underground, you have suddenly stumbled upon royal treasure. Not only do you become rich, but you are also visited by the mystical conviction that some higher power has looked upon you with the eye of grace and magnanimously elevated you above others, electing you its favorite.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “Shah of Shahs”
“Many photographs preserve the moment when the first oil spurts from the well: people jumping for joy, falling into each other’s arms, weeping.
Oil creates the illusion of a completely changed life, life without work, life for free. Oil is a resource that anesthetizes thought, blurs vision, corrupts. People from poor countries go around thinking: God, if only we had oil! The concept of oil expresses perfectly the eternal human dream of wealth achieved through lucky accident, through a kiss of fortune and not by sweat, anguish, hard work. In this sense oil is a fairy tale, and like every fairy tale, a bit of a lie. Oil fills us with such arrogance that we begin believing we can easily overcome such unyielding obstacles as time.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “Shah of Shahs”
“The indispensable catalyst is the word, the explanatory idea. More than petards or stilettoes, therefore, words — uncontrolled words, circulating freely, underground, rebelliously, not gotten up in dress uniforms, uncertified — frighten tyrants.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “Shah of Shahs”
“The so-called exotic has never fascinated me, even though I came to spend more than a dozen years in a world that is exotic by definition. I did not write about hunting crocodiles or head-hunters, although I admit they are interesting subjects. I discovered instead a different reality, one that attracted me more than expeditions to the villages of witch doctors or wild animal reserves. A new Africa was being born — and this was not a figure of speech or a platitude from an editorial. The hour of its birth was sometimes dramatic and painful, sometimes enjoyable and jubilant; it was always different (from our point of view) from anything we had known, and it was exactly this difference that struck me as new, as the previously undescribed, as exotic.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “The Soccer War”
“All over the world, at any hour, on a million screens an infinite number of people are saying something to us, trying to convince us of something, gesturing, making faces, getting excited, smiling, nodding their heads, pointing their fingers, and we don’t know what it’s about, what they want from us, what they are summoning us to. They might as well have come from a distance planet — an enormous army of public relations experts from Venus or Mars — yet they are our kin, with the same bones and blood as ours, with lips that move and audible voices, but we cannot understand a word. In what language will the universal dialogue of humanity be carried out? Several hundred languages are fighting for recognition and promotion; the language barriers are rising. Deafness and incomprehension are multiplying.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “Shah of Shahs”
“In those days, the 1960s, the world was very interested in Africa. Africa was a puzzle, a mystery. Nobody knew what would happen when 300 million people stood up and demanded the right to be heard. States began to be established there, and the states bought armaments, and there was speculation in foreign newspapers that Africa might set out to conquer Europe. Today it is impossible to contemplate such a prospect, but that time, it was a concern, an anxiety. It was serious. People wanted to know what was happening on the continent: where was it headed, what were its intentions?”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “The Soccer War”
“It is not the story that is not getting expressed: it’s what surrounds the story. The climate, the atmosphere of the street, the feeling of the people, the gossip of the town, the smell; the thousand, thousand elements of reality that are part of the event you read about in 600 words in your morning paper.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, interviewed by Bill Buford in Granta 21 (1987)
“You know, sometimes the critical response to my books is amusing. There are so many complaints: Kapuscinski never mentions dates, Kapuscinski never gives us the name of the minister, he has forgotten the order of events. All that, of course, is exactly what I avoid. If those are the questions you want answered, you can visit your local library, where you will find everything you need: the newspapers of the time, the reference books, a dictionary.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, interviewed by Bill Buford in Granta 21 (1987)
“Denna kontinent är alltför stor för att beskrivas. Den är som en ocean, som en egen planet, ett mångskiftande, överflödande kosmos. Det är bara med största förenkling, för bekvämlighets skull, som vi säger: Afrika. För bortsett från det geografiska namnet finns i själva verket inget Afrika.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “Ebenholtz”