Quotes from John Kani

Shakespeare's words paint pictures in glorious colour in my language. They were written by a man whose use of words fits exactly into Xhosa.

Everything you do on stage is always a response to something, not the next line.

When I first encountered Shakespeare as a boy, I read every word this man has written. To me, he is like an African storyteller.

We've got the right to vote, but what does it mean? People now want to have the right to a job, the right to education, the right to medical services.

My grandfather told me our history through his stories about all the great Zulu battles.

We haven't got those dreams: 'I wish to become doctor or a lawyer.' Black people in South Africa have been barred in doing anything that would articulate their cause.

I had to look at white people as fellow South Africans and fellow partners in building a new South Africa.

If we'd lived in England or America we'd have told stories abut our lives and nobody would have called it protest theatre. But the reality of South Africa was the arrests and detentions and oppression - we could not escape that, so we decided to take it on.

And I'm part of the generation of South Africans who feel we're lucky to be alive.

All over the world, there is someone sitting in a cell because he or she is not allowed freedom of expression.

'Sizwe' is the beginning of protest theatre; 'Nothing But The Truth' is post-apartheid South Africa.

It is a troubled soul that forces the human being to act. It is some kind of gangrene within you, inside of you, that eats your soul, that forces you to save your soul.