# Quote — Ben Okri, The Famished Road

> We disliked the rigours of existence, the unfulfilled longings, the enshrined injustices of the world, the labyrinths of love, the ignorance of parents, the fact of dying, and the amazing indifference of the Living in the midst of the simple beauties of the universe. We feared the heartlessness of human beings, all of whom are born blind, few of whom ever learn to see.

- Author: [Ben Okri](https://www.leafyquotes.com/ben-okri.md)
- Book: [The Famished Road](https://www.leafyquotes.com/ben-okri/the-famished-road.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ben_Okri#The_Famished_Road_(1991)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/ben-okri/the-famished-road/we-disliked-the

## More from this book

> The clearing was the beginning of an expressway. Building companies had levelled the trees. In places the earth was red. We passed a tree that had been felled. Red liquid dripped from its stump as if the tree had been a murdered giant whose blood wouldn’t stop flowing.

p. 16 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/ben-okri/the-famished-road/the-clearing-was.md)

> One human life is deeper than the ocean. Strange fishes and sea-monsters and mighty plants live in the rock-bed of our spirits. The whole of human history is an undiscovered continent deep in our souls. There are dolphins, plants that dream, magic birds inside us. The sky is inside us. The earth is in us.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/ben-okri/the-famished-road/one-human-life.md)

> "Learn to drink, my son. A man must be able to hold his drink because drunkenness is sometimes necessary in this difficult life."

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/ben-okri/the-famished-road/learn-to-drink.md)