Quote

the hopelessness that comes from knowing too little and feeling too much (so brittle, so dry he is in danger of the reverse: feeling nothing and knowing everything)

Toni Morrison

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Toni Morrison
Age: 88 †
Born: 1931
Born: February 18
Died: 2019
Died: August 5
Audiobook Narrator
Librettist
Novelist
Poet
University Teacher
Writer
Lorain
Ohio
Chloe Ardelia Wofford
Chloe Anthony Wofford-Morrison
Chloe Anthony Wofford
Morrison
Chloe Anthony Wofford Morrison
Little
Dry
Everything
Reverse
Nothing
Danger
Much
Feeling
Knowing
Comes
Feelings
Brittle
Littles
Hopelessness

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No matter what all your teeth and wet fingers anticipated, there was no accounting for the way that simple joy could shake you.
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Oppressive language does more than represent violence it is violence does more than represent the limits of knowledge it limits knowledge.
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Womanists is what black feminists used to call themselves. Very much so. They were not the same thing. And also the relationship with men. Historically, black women have always sheltered their men because they were out there, and they were the ones that were most likely to be killed.
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A son ain't what a woman say. A son is what a man do.
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Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper? The Lion or the Mouse? Poppy or the Snake?
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Being able to laugh got me through.
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This word LOVE - discredited, clicheed - can be restored and love, the instinct, the impulse to care for somebody in the hope that somebody will care for you - plus our language, the language, a language - is about all we have. With everything else going on, this is what makes us, what keeps us human.
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Black women have always been friends. I mean, if you didn't have each other you had nothing.
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Intimacy is extremely important to me and I want it to be extremely important to the readers.
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The habit of getting up early, which I had formed when the children were young, now became my choice. I am not very bright or very witty or very inventive after the sun goes down.
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At some point in life the world's beauty becomes enough. You don't need to photograph, paint or even remember it. It is enough.
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Anything I have ever learned of any consequence, I have learned from Black people. I have never been bored by any Black person, ever.
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Books ARE a form of political action. Books are knowledge. Books are reflection. Books change your mind.
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Don’t beg anybody for anything, especially love.
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Nelson Mandela is, for me, the single statesman in the world. The single statesman, in that literal sense, who is not solving all his problems with guns. It's truly unbelievable.
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What do you say? There really are no words for that. There really aren't. Somebody tries to say, 'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.' People say that to me. There's no language for it. Sorry doesn't do it. I think you should just hug people and mop their floor or something.
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But to find out the truth about how dreams die, one should never take the word of the dreamer.
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Not knowing it was hard knowing it was harder
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