Quote

Make up a story... For our sake and yours forget your name in the street tell us what the world has been to you in the dark places and in the light. Don't tell us what to believe, what to fear. Show us belief's wide skirt and the stitch that unravels fear's caul.

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
World
Fear
Streets
Stitch
Tell
Name
Stitches
Shows
Names
Skirt
Stories
Belief
Skirts
Light
Dark
Wide
Writing
Forget
Street
Believe
Story
Sake
Make
Show
Places
Unravels

More quotes by Toni Morrison

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It was my father who could do no wrong. So I didn't think of it as, oh, look, my father's a violent man.
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Love it, love it and the beat and beating heart, love that too. More than eyes or feet. More than lungs that have yet to draw free air. More than your life-holding womb and your life-giving private parts, hear me now, love your heart. For this is the prize.
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He leans over and takes her hand. With the other he touches her face. ‘You your best thing, Sethe. You are.’ His holding fingers are holding hers. ‘Me? Me?
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I tell my students there is such a thing as 'writer's block,' and they should respect it. You shouldn't write through it. It's blocked because it ought to be blocked, because you haven't got it right now.
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Usually I try to be there by six. Everything has been taken off the walls so that there's nothing to arrest my sight. On the bed I have Roget's Thesaurus, a dictionary, a Bible, and a deck of playing cards.
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Evil is just sort of ultimately boring. The good thing is just complicated. It's more provocative to me and more stimulating to me.
Toni Morrison
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If you're going to hold someone down you're going to have to hold on by the other end of the chain. You are confined by your own repression.
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To get to a place where you could love anything you chose--not to need permission for desire--well now _that_ was freedom.
Toni Morrison
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You marvel at the economy and this choice of words. How many ways can you describe the sky and the moon? After Sylvia Plath, what can you say?
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The presence of evil was something to be first recognized, then dealt with, survived, outwitted, triumphed over.
Toni Morrison
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When am I happy and when am I sad and what is the difference? What do I need to know to stay alive? What is true in the world?
Toni Morrison
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I couldn't bear to have people mispronounce my name. But the person I was was this person who was called Chloe.
Toni Morrison
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Did you ever see the way the clouds love a mountain? They circle all around it sometimes you can't even see the mountain for the clouds. But you know what? ... The clouds never cover the head. His head pokes through, because the clouds let him they don't wrap him up. They let him keep his head high, free.
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If you can't count, they can cheat you. If you can't read, they can beat you.
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My children are delightful people, whom I would love even if they weren't my children.
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Books ARE a form of political action. Books are knowledge. Books are reflection. Books change your mind.
Toni Morrison
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You rely on a sentence to say more than the denotation and the connotation you revel in the smoke that the words send up.
Toni Morrison
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I know there's some poetry that sort of sounds like daisies, but most of the good poetry is also [political], you can feel the heartbeat it's about some situation that concerns human beings under duress. It's suggesting a solution, or just acknowledging that [the situation] exists. Art does that.
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A man ain't nothing but a man. But a son? Well, now, that's somebody.
Toni Morrison
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I tell my students one of the most important things they need to know is when they are at their best, creatively. They need to ask themselves, What does the ideal room look like? Is there music? Is there silence? Is there chaos outside or is there serenity outside? What do I need in order to release my imagination?
Toni Morrison