Born in Lorain, Ohio, a town near Cleveland, she was originally named Chloe Ardelia Wofford. Later in life, combining a diminutive of her confirmation name with the surname of her husband, “Toni Morrison” became a name known to all (or should be!)
Her debut novel, The Bluest Eye, appeared in 1970. The pre-World War II story concerns a teenage girl, Percola, who, having been impregnated by her father, is being temporarily cared for by another family in Lorain, Ohio. Amid symbols that are both supernatural and sociological, one of Percola’s foster sisters narrates the account with magical thinking as well as realistically sociological perception. Though frequently challenged, banned, and censored by officials in American high schools, this novel is a brilliant portrayal of the conflict between Black identity. Young women were adversely affected by the prevailing attitude of the society; they felt “ugly” when they compared themselves and the standard of beauty only whites had been allowed to define at the time. The novel’s title reinforces that notion, as in a section of Gwendolyn Brooks poem “In the Mecca,” both whites and blacks had been taught that “Whiteness is great.”
Another quotation – a verse from Romans 9:25-- forms the epigraph for what arguably may be the most celebrated among all of Toni Morrison’s eleven novels, Beloved, first published in 1987. Suggested by an actual historical incident, this is a fictional account of a black woman in the time of the Civil War era in similar circumstances. The woman named Sethe murders one of her children in order to save her from the torture of an enslaved life. After Sethe escapes and settles in Cincinnati, the deceased child returns to haunt her as a ghost. There is no doubt that Beloved is a work of art yet in addition it can be considered a reflection of African-American experience and as such – despite the paranormal elements – an accurate one. Sethe’s motive is not unlike the ultraviolent character Bigger Thomas in Native Son, albeit Richard Wright's novel has with a 20th century setting and a naturalistic style. Sethe personifies the extreme lengths Black Americans have been forced to go because of the destruction transformation caused by relentless suffering.
A 2015 New York Times profile about Toni Morrison acknowledges the fact that her position and descriptions of race are “varied and complicated.” Her purpose in writing is neither didactic nor polemical but rather a response to the human condition as experienced by Blacks. As she tells the interviewer, Toni Morrison says her purpose is to “suggest what the conflicts are, what the problems are;” the author’s role is to record and reflect.
According to The Reader’s Encyclopedia, “Morrison’s novels expose the formerly disregarded experience of the black American woman. Her language is musical and precise, creating evocative dialogue and merging mythical, supernatural elements with reality to paint a bleak and painful portrait of American life.”
Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison’s third novel, won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1979. She received the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for Beloved in 1988. In 1993 she made history by becoming the first Black female writer to win a Nobel Prize in Literature. Seven years later the National Endowment for the Humanities presented her with its highest award, the Medal of Honor.
This coming Sunday, February 18, 2018 will mark the 87th birthday of Toni Morrison. We thank her for her transformative contribution to American culture and send her best wishes for her years to come.
Please read this profile, if you can:
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/12/m...-morrison.html