The best art is political and you ought to be able to make it unquestionably political and irrevocably beautiful at the same time.
TONI MORRISONMy theory is that the world is a difficult place to live in and distraction is the name of the game.
More Toni Morrison Quotes
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Black boys became criminalized. I was in constant dread for their lives, because they were targets everywhere. They still are.
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I wrote my first novel because I wanted to read it.
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As you enter positions of trust and power, dream a little before you think.
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Misery don’t call ahead. That’s why you have to stay awake – otherwise it just walks on in your door.
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The enemy is not men. The enemy is the concept of patriarchy, the concept of patriarchy as the way to run the world or do things.
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If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, you must be the one to write it.
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What a woman. What a life.
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Lonely was much better than alone.
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She learned the intricacy of loneliness: the horror of color, the roar of soundlessness and the menace of familiar objects lying still.
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Literature, it seems to me, is wisdom.
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He can’t value you more than you value yourself.
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You free. Nothing and nobody is obliged to save you but 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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Perhaps that’s what all human relationships boiled down to: Would you save my life? or would you take it?
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I get angry about things, then go on and work.
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If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it.
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There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.
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You wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down.
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Something that is loved is never lost.
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Black people’s music is in a class by itself and always has been.
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I think some aspects of writing can be taught. Obviously, you can’t teach vision or talent. But you can help with comfort.
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Definitions belong to the definers, not the defined.
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The peace I am thinking of is the dance of an open mind when it engages another equally open one.
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A writer’s life and work are not a gift to mankind; they are its necessity.
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For me the history of the place of black people in this country is so varied, complex and beautiful. And impactful.
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A sister can be seen as someone who is both ourselves and very much not ourselves – a special kind of double.
TONI MORRISON