Quote

Most of the really good literature I've read in my life was political, meaning it was important - about something going on in the history of the world - or contemporary.

Toni Morrison

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Something
Contemporary
Really
Meaning
Good
Literature
Life
Read
World
History
Political
Important
Going

More quotes by Toni Morrison

Image
Everywhere, everywhere, children are the scorned people of the earth.
Toni Morrison
Image
Clever, but schoolteacher beat him anyway to show him that definitions belonged to the definers - not the defined.
Toni Morrison
Image
Definitions belong to the definers, not the defined.
Toni Morrison
Image
Risky, thought Paul D, very risky. For a used-to-be-slave woman to love anything that much was dangerous, especially if it was her children she had settled on to love. The best thing, he knew, was to love just a little bit, so when they broke its back, or shoved it in a croaker sack, well, maybe you'd have a little love left over for the next one.
Toni Morrison
Image
If a Negro got legs he ought to use them. Sit down too long, somebody will figure out a way to tie them up.
Toni Morrison
Image
You looked at them and wondered why they were so ugly you looked closely and could not find the source. Then you realized that it came from conviction, their conviction. It was as though some mysterious all-knowing master had given each one a cloak of ugliness to wear, and they had each accepted it without question.
Toni Morrison
Image
It seems to me everything Shakespeare did was political.
Toni Morrison
Image
It would be ten years before they saw each other again, and their meeting would be thick with birds.
Toni Morrison
Image
The difference between that which is humane and that which is patriotic is a vital difference.
Toni Morrison
Image
I'm interested in the way in which the past affects the present and I think that if we understand a good deal more about history, we automatically understand a great more about contemporary life.
Toni Morrison
Image
They encouraged you to put some of your weight in their hands and soon as you felt how light and lovely it was, they studied your scars and tribulations.
Toni Morrison
Image
I am in the position of judging people by the best they've ever done rather than the worst.
Toni Morrison
Image
We mistook violence for passion, indolence for leisure, and thought recklessness was freedom.
Toni Morrison
Image
We're all surrounded by what I call faux language, fake language of commerce, of news media.
Toni Morrison
Image
I guess I'm depressed. I don't know. I can't explain it. Part of it is the irritability of being 84, and part of it is being not as physically strong as I once was. And part of it is my misunderstanding, I think, of what's going on in the world.
Toni Morrison
Image
A dead hydrangea is as intricate and lovely as one in bloom. Bleak sky is as seductive as sunshine, miniature orange trees without blossom or fruit are not defective they are that.
Toni Morrison
Image
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
Image
The theme you choose may change or simply elude you, but being your own story means you can always choose the tone. It also means that you can invent the language to say who are you and what you mean.
Toni Morrison
Image
No gasp at a miracle that is truly miraculous because the magic lies in the fact that you knew it was there for you all along.
Toni Morrison
Image
He said, 'Always. Always.
Toni Morrison