CURATED COLLECTION

How Power Corrupts People

Power doesn't reveal character — it accelerates it, and these quotes track what that acceleration looks like.

50 quotes found

“
Power is a thing that drives people mad.

—Sony Labou TansiPlaywright & Novelist

Post-War ERA • West Africa

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How can she reasonably love a Man who is always using his Power against her?

—Mary AstellPhilosopher, Feminist & Writer

Enlightenment ERA • Western Europe

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Power is a thing that corrupts not only the man, but his humanity.

—Wole SoyinkaPlaywright, Poet & Novelist

Post-War ERA • West Africa

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The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any.

—Alice WalkerNovelist, Poet & Activist

Late Modern ERA • North America

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Power only serves to separate people. Power without justice is a machine of isolation.

—Eduardo GaleanoJournalist & Author

Late Modern ERA • Latin America

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History is what the people in power choose to remember.

—Esi EdugyanNovelist

Digital Age ERA • North America

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War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.

—George OrwellNovelist & Essayist

Early Modern ERA • Western Europe

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Words are free, it's how you use them that may cost you.

—Abiodun OyewolePoet

Post-War ERA • North America

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The tiger does not proclaim its tigritude. It pounces.

—Wole SoyinkaPlaywright, Poet & Novelist

Post-War ERA • West Africa

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My work is about power. Who has it, who doesn't, and how it's represented.

—Kehinde WileyArtist

Digital Age ERA • North America

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If you're not careful, newspapers will have you hating the oppressed and loving the oppressors.

—Malcolm XActivist & Minister

Post-War ERA • North America

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When the missionaries came to Africa, they had the Bible and we had the land.

—Jomo KenyattaPresident

Early Modern ERA • East Africa

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Truth is not what you see, but what you choose to believe, what you build.

—Pham Thi HoaiNovelist & Essayist

Late Modern ERA • Southeast Asia

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I will not be the tributary of any foreign power.

—Queen NzingaQueen

Renaissance ERA • Southern Africa

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Our power is in our collective, not in our individual.

—Alicia GarzaActivist

Digital Age ERA • North America

“
Long live the king, but death to bad government!

—Túpac Amaru IIAuthor & Thinker

Enlightenment ERA • Latin America

“
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

—George OrwellNovelist & Essayist

Early Modern ERA • Western Europe

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A people may let a king fall, yet still remain a people; but if a king let his people fall, then is he no longer a king.

—Abigail AdamsWriter & President

Enlightenment ERA • North America

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The surface of American society is covered with a layer of democratic paint.

—Alexis de TocquevilleScientist & Historian

Industrial Age ERA • Western Europe

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The colonizer's language became our own, twisted, vibrant, full of defiant new meanings.

—Jessica HagedornNovelist, Poet & Artist

Late Modern ERA • Southeast Asia

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