And so the spirits just gazed at us with eyes milked dry of care.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

...and the women spread their tsar and sit on one side, the men on the other, like they are two different rivers that are not supposed to meet.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

And they had nothing, except of course memories, their own, and those passed down by their mothers and mothers' mothers. A nation's memory.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

Because we were not in our country, we could not use our own languages, and so when we spoke our voices came out bruised.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

Generally the men always tried to appear strong; they walked tall, heads upright, arms steady at the sides, and feet firmly planted like trees. Solid, Jericho walls of men. But when they went out in the bush to relieve themselves and nobody was looking, the fell apart like crumbling towers and wept with the wretched grief of forgotten concubines. And when they returned to the presence of their women and children and everybody else, they stuck hands deep inside torn pockets until they felt their dry thighs, kicked little stones out of the way, and erected themselves like walls again, but then the women, who knew all the ways of weeping and all there was to know about falling apart, would not be deceived; they gently rose from the hearths, beat dust off their skirts, and planted themselves like rocks in front of their men and children and shacks, and only then did all appear almost tolerable.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

I am careful not to look anyone in the face because I don't want them to see the shame in my eyes, and I also don't want to see the laughter in theirs.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

I am starting to talk fast now, and I have to remember to slow down because when I get excited, I start to sound like myself and my American accent goes away.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

If you are stealing something it’s better if it’s small and rideable or something you can eat quickly and be done with, like guavas. This way, people can’t see you with the thing to be reminded that you are a shameless thief and that you stole it from them, so I don’t know what the white people were trying to do in the first place, stealing not just a tiny piece but a whole country. Who can ever forget you stole something like that?

— NoViolet Bulawayo

[Jesus Christ] used to have blue eyes, but I painted them brown like mine and everybody’s, to make him normal.

— NoViolet Bulawayo

Running and chanting, the word change in the air like it's something you can grab and put in your mouth and sink your teeth into.

— NoViolet Bulawayo