“If a nation cannot face its past, it has no future.”

—  Ai Weiwei

2010-, Ai Weiwei: ‘Shame on Me.’, 2011

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 14, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "If a nation cannot face its past, it has no future." by Ai Weiwei?
Ai Weiwei photo
Ai Weiwei 218
Chinese concept artist 1957

Related quotes

Samuel Taylor Coleridge photo

“The Earth with its scarred face is the symbol of the Past; the Air and Heaven, of Futurity.”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English poet, literary critic and philosopher

2 June 1824
Table Talk (1821–1834)

Robert Penn Warren photo

“If you could not accept the past and its burden, there was no future, for without one there cannot be the other, and […] if you could accept the past you might hope for the future, for only out of the past can you make the future.”

Robert Penn Warren book All the King's Men

Source: All the King's Men (1946)

Alex Salmond photo

“A nation which is ignorant of its history cannot properly make choices about its future.”

Alex Salmond (1954) Scottish National Party politician and former First Minister of Scotland

St Andrew's Day (November 30, 2007)

Pearl S. Buck photo

“One faces the future with one's past.”

Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973) American writer
Prevale photo

“The past has ended its time, the present is the moment, the future the becoming.”

Prevale (1983) Italian DJ and producer

Original: (it) Il passato ha concluso il suo tempo, il presente è l'attimo, il futuro il divenire.
Source: prevale.net

“The peoples of Europe are a work in progress and always must be… The history of the people of Europe has not ended -- it never will. Ethnogenesis is a process of the present and future as much as it is the past. No efforts of romantics, politicians, or social scientists can preserve once and for all some essential soul of a people or nation. Nor can any effort ensure that nations, ethnic groups, and communities of today will not vanish utterly in the future. The past may have set the parameters within which one can build the future, but it cannot determine what that future must be.”

Patrick J. Geary (1948) historian

Patrick J. Geary, The Myth of Nations: The Medieval Origins of Europe, Princeton University Press, 2003

Alexis De Tocqueville photo

“As the past has ceased to throw its light upon the future, the mind of man wanders in obscurity.”

Alexis De Tocqueville book Democracy in America

Variant translation: When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.
Book Four, Chapter VIII
Democracy in America, Volume II (1840), Book Four

Syama Prasad Mookerjee photo

“A nation that fails to take pride in its past achievements or to take inspiration therefrom, can never build up the present or plan for the future. A weak nation can never attain greatness.”

Syama Prasad Mookerjee (1901–1953) Indian politician

Dr. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee Quoted from Talreja, K. M. (2000). Holy Vedas and holy Bible: A comparative study. New Delhi: Rashtriya Chetana Sangathan.

Arthur C. Clarke photo

“The future is built on the rubble of the past; wisdom lies in facing that fact, not in fighting against it.”

Arthur C. Clarke book The Road to the Sea

The Road to the Sea, p. 265
2000s and posthumous publications, The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke (2001)

Related topics