If you could have a gigantic billboard anywhere, what would it say and why?
Recorded Malala Yousafzai said elsewhere, not written here
Why is it that countries which we call strong are so powerful in creating wars but are so weak in bringing peace? Why is it that giving guns is so easy but giving books is so hard? Why is it, why is it that making tanks is so easy, but building schools is so hard?

Oslo City Hall, The Nobel Foundation, 10 December 2014 source ↗

2 versions

Earlier wording is kept rather than replaced. This is the record of how the answer moved, not evidence that it should not have.

  1. Version 1 superseded 28 Aug 2026
    Why is it that countries which we call strong" are so powerful in creating wars but are so weak in bringing peace? Why is it that giving guns is so easy but giving books is so hard? Why is it, why is it that making tanks is so easy, but building schools is so hard?
  2. Version 2 Current

    Corrected against the source.

    Why is it that countries which we call strong are so powerful in creating wars but are so weak in bringing peace? Why is it that giving guns is so easy but giving books is so hard? Why is it, why is it that making tanks is so easy, but building schools is so hard?

Others on this question

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Marcus Rashford England international footballer
We know there are over 380,000 children across the UK today that have never owned a book, children that are in vulnerable environments. That has to change. My books are, and always will be, for every child, even if I have to deliver them myself. We will reach them.
Recorded Statement on the launch of the Marcus Rashford Book Club, Sky Sports, 16 November 2020 source ↗
Ahmed Zewail Chemist; Nobel laureate in Chemistry, 1999
At the age of 21, as a Moeid, I believed that behind every universal phenomenon there must be beauty and simplicity in its description. This belief remains true today.
Recorded Laureate-written autobiography for Les Prix Nobel, Nobel Prize Outreach, 1 December 1999 source ↗
Jacinda Ardern Prime Minister of New Zealand, 2017–2023; Leader of the Labour Party 2017–2023
We are the richer for our difference, and poorer for our division. Through genuine debate and dialogue, through rebuilding trust in information and one another, through empathy – let us reclaim the space in between.
Recorded Tercentenary Theatre, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard Magazine, 26 May 2022 source ↗
Peter Doherty Veterinary surgeon and immunologist; Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine, 1996
I share Alfred Nobel's conviction that war is the greatest of all human disasters. Infectious disease runs a good second.
Recorded Laureate-written autobiography for Les Prix Nobel, Nobel Prize Outreach, 1 December 1996 source ↗

More from Malala Yousafzai

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Question What is one of the best or most worthwhile investments you have ever made — of money, time, or energy? Money & investment
Her story is why I dedicate the Nobel Peace Prize money to the Malala Fund, to help give girls quality education, everywhere, anywhere in the world and to raise their voices. The first place this funding will go to is where my heart is, to build schools in Pakistan—especially in my home of Swat and Shangla.
Recorded Oslo City Hall, The Nobel Foundation, 10 December 2014 source ↗

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