We mistook violence for passion, indolence for leisure, and thought recklessness was freedom.
TONI MORRISONWe mistook violence for passion, indolence for leisure, and thought recklessness was freedom.
TONI MORRISONLiberation means you don’t have to be silenced.
TONI MORRISONLike any artist without an art form, she became dangerous.
TONI MORRISONBeauty was not simply something to behold; it was something one could do.
TONI MORRISONI want to discourage you from choosing anything or making any decision simply because it is safe. Things of value seldom are.
TONI MORRISONAnything dead coming back to life hurts.
TONI MORRISONI’ve spent my entire writing life trying to make sure that the white gaze was not the dominant one in any of my books.
TONI MORRISONI wrote my first novel because I wanted to read it.
TONI MORRISONThere 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.
TONI MORRISONFreedom is choosing your responsibility. It’s not having no responsibilitie s; it’s choosing the ones you want.
TONI MORRISONWriting is really a way of thinking–not just feeling but thinking about things that are disparate, unresolved, mysterious, problematic or just sweet.
TONI MORRISONThere is an incredible amount of magic and feistiness in black men that nobody has been able to wipe out. But everybody has tried.
TONI MORRISONA writer’s life and work are not a gift to mankind; they are its necessity.
TONI MORRISONSometimes what I write on the page frightens me, so I feel free when I write, but I don’t feel safe.
TONI MORRISONShe learned the intricacy of loneliness: the horror of color, the roar of soundlessness and the menace of familiar objects lying still.
TONI MORRISONWhen there is pain, there are no words. All pain is the same.
TONI MORRISON