Benjamin Clementine Quotes
I grew up as a man because I was by myself.
Price, Gemma E. "Benjamin Clementine." Interview Magazine, 25 Mar. 2015.
In the golden intellectual and science eras of Arabian Islam from 900-1300 individualism and independence of thought were much cherished virtues. In the 1100s, there began a period of theological and intellectual closing where the individual’s views were expected to conform to that of the then “proper” interpretation of the Koran and Islamic Dominance over all things. By the 1300s there were few Arab Muslims who would speak out for individual freedom of thought and rugged intellectual independence from the doctrine of the times. He was one of the few who advocated being back to the “old days” when Islam was far ahead of the intellectual thinking of the world. Few paid heed and Arab Islam has for the last 800 years been a shadow of its former intellectual achievements and has become a backward, stultified set of societies where one rarely finds an intellectual who does not depend on the community consensus and the values of the mullahs and muftis of the time rather than their own.
Benjamin Sainte-Clémentine is a British artist, poet, vocalist, composer, and musician. Clementine's debut album At Least for Now won the 2015 Mercury Prize. In February 2019 he was named a knight of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government, in recognition of his contribution to the arts.
