hi I'm Clint Smith and this is Crash

Course black American history

the difficulty for me in writing among

the difficulties is to write language

that can work quietly on a page for a

reader

who doesn't hear anything

Tony Morrison said in a 1993 interview

with the Paris review

going on to say

now for that

one has to work very carefully

with what is in between the words

what is not said

I first encountered Toni Morrison's work

in high school

it was most often atop a sea of unmade

sheets on my bed with two pillows

propping me up against the headboard

I used one of those cheap drugstore pens

to underline the sections that most

resonated it was tough for me then

to read in places where there was a lot

of noise

I preferred reading and writing in my

room

or I could listen to the soft scratch of

Ink on paper and a ceiling fan whirring

above

which is to say
I first encountered Morrison's words

in the silence that she alludes to in

this series we've talked about a number

of authors who have used their work to

share the lives and experiences of black

Americans on the page

and the person we're discussing today

Tony Morrison

is one of the best writers that this

country has ever produced she changed

the literary landscape she challenged

the traditionally white male Canon of

literature

she did it on her own terms

let's start the show

[Music]

I don't know how else to put him

Toni Morrison is a legend she published

everything from plays to children's

books her novels earned many prestigious

Awards including the Pulitzer Prize and

the presidential medal of freedom she

also was the first black American woman

to win a Nobel Prize for literature much

of her work centers on the stories of

black people at different points

throughout American history she talks

about their highs and their lows their

triumphs and their failures and the

consequences of racism in everyday life

her work emphasizes the loss memory

psychological trauma and joy of black

life she wrote in ways that remain

enjoyable to Everyday readers while

inspiring writers of all Races she

helped highlight black American

literature serving as a catalyst for it

to be nationally and internationally

recognized Toni Morrison was born Chloe

Wofford 1931.

Chloe was the second of four children

she grew up in Lorraine Ohio in an

environment where segregation wasn't the

law but the invisible lines were

understood although her family struggled

in the aftermath of the Great Depression

she credits her childhood as what

motivated her to eventually write

hearing African-American folklore and

music learning about African-American

cultural rituals and growing up working

class when she was 12 years old Chloe

converted to Catholicism she was

baptized under the name Anthony for

Saint Anthony of Padua and it would be

under the nickname Tony that she would

become world famous after graduating

with honors from Lorraine High School in

Ohio in 1949 she attended Howard

University

Tony experienced the dangers and horrors

of the segregated South while touring

with the Howard players an acting Club

but she also started to connect with

other black writers activists and

artists she graduated with a bachelor's

degree in English in 1953 and then went

on to complete her master of arts in

American literature from Cornell

University in 1955 after she obtained

her Masters she taught English at

various hbcus she married Harold

Morrison an architect and had two

children in 1958 she returned to Howard

University as a lecturer and joined the

writing group where she would begin

working on her first novel she spent

seven years at Howard University got

divorced and then became an editor of

the textbook division of Random House

publishing where she quickly moved up

the ranks she eventually became a senior

editor at random house the only black

American woman to hold that position in

the company at the time Morrison used

her power and influence as an Editor to

publish many books by black American

Writers including Tony K Bambara Gail

Jones June Jordan and Angela Davis

many credit her with introducing a whole

new group of black writers to The Wider

World while elevating the Black authors

around her by putting their work into

print Morrison started to put her own

work in the spotlight

remember that novel she started working

on at Howard a few years earlier well

after waking up at 4am each morning to

work on it while raising her two

children on her own it became her first

published novel The Bluest Eye it came

out in 1970 and Tony was 39 years old

The Bluest Eye is about Picola breadlot

a young black girl who had an extremely

difficult childhood and believed that

her life would be better if she just had

blue eyes like the white people around

her it was seen by some as a

controversial book and was met with

pretty mixed reviews but Tony Morrison

stated in later interviews that the

book's reception was very similar to how

other characters treated her main

character in the novel

Morrison said she was dismissed

trivialized misread the lack of a warm

initial reception for The Bluest Eye

didn't stop Morrison she published her

second novel Sula only three years later

in this book Morrison explores morality

ethics and relationships through the

friendship between two black women this

book had a much more positive reception

Than The Bluest Eye and it was even

nominated for a national book award by

the time Morrison published her third

novel Song of Solomon in 1977. she was a

household name in the black community

this was one of the few books Morrison

wrote with a male protagonist a young

man searching for his identity while

trying to escape an oppressive Society

this was her first truly commercially

successful book it became the first book

written by a black American Author to be

selected by the book of the month club

since Richard Wright's Native Son in the

1940s she received a national book

critic Circle award along with many

other accolades the book became a staple

of American literature in classrooms

among academics and for General readers

this success encouraged Morrison to

become a full-time writer in 1987

Morrison released what many considered

to be her magnum opus beloved the book

is inspired by the true story of

Margaret Garner an African-American

woman who was living in slavery the main

character of beloved is setha a formerly

enslaved woman was constantly haunted by

her dead child after making the

gut-wrenching decision to kill her

children rather than see them become

enslaved though three of her children

survived

infant daughter did not Morrison

dedicates the book to the millions of

Africans killed during the course of the

Atlantic slave trade the title of the

book is taken from Romans chapter 9

which states quote

those who were not my people

I will call my people and her who was

not beloved

I will call Beloved the story explores

themes of loss morality and the

impossible choices that befall the

oppressed the book became an enormous

critical and Commercial Success it was a

bestseller for 25 weeks and won many

awards including the Pulitzer Prize or

fiction from the 1980s onward Morrison's

literary prowess impacted the minds and

hearts of much of the world she

continued to win Awards and honors

throughout her life and in 1989 she

became a professor in the creative

writing program at Princeton University

in 1993 she became the first black woman

to win the Nobel Prize in literature in

1996 she was chosen by the National

Endowment for the Humanities to give the

Jefferson lecture and also when the

national book foundation's medal for

distinguished contribution to American

letters also Oprah Winfrey loved her I

mean really really loved her it was

Oprah who helped bring Tony Morrison's

work even further into the mainstream

and she selected four of Morrison's

novels in six years for her book club

with an average of 13 million viewers

watching these book club segments the

support from Oprah helped Morrison sell

millions of copies and gave her an even

bigger sales boost than she experienced

when she won the Nobel Prize in 1998

beloved was even made into a movie

starring well Oprah as well as Tandy Way

Newton and Danny Glover and honestly the

rest is history

Morrison received a dozen honorary

degrees and was a guest curator at the

Louvre museum in Paris she received the

presidential medal of freedom which was

awarded to her by the first black

president of the United States Barack

Obama in total she wrote 11 novels nine

non-fiction works five children's books

two short stories and two plays

throughout her life she died on August

5th 2019 in New York City several years

ago before she passed away I had the

opportunity to see Morrison give a

lecture in person

it was an extraordinary experience to

physically be in the presence of one of

the greatest writers to have ever lived

when Morrison came onto the stage the

audience Rose to their feet and gave a

resounding Round of Applause

whistles and cheers ricocheted across

the vastness of the room Morrison was

brought to a table at the front of the

stage cloaked in a red cloth that had a

small glass of water at its corner at 85

years old

she was still remarkably Lucid as I

listened to her speak I thought of my

future children

how one day they will read Morrison and

how they might Marvel at the fact that

their father once shared a room with

this writer who seemed to belong to

another world
I will tell them that when she spoke

the vows stretched across the theater

like a hammock I will tell them that her

laughter

pushed open the walls of the room and

invited everyone in Morrison laid the

foundation for generations of black

writers that followed she rejected the

idea that being black or being a woman

might hinder her appeal or the

universality of her work in a 1987

interview with the New York Times

Morrison said quote

I really think the range of emotions and

perceptions I've had access to as a

black person and as a female person are

greater than those people who are

neither

so it seems to me that my world did not

shrink because I was a black female

writer it just got bigger Morrison is

gone now but she indeed made the world

bigger she built upon her literary

ancestors and paved the way for her

literary descendants

she is one of the best writers to have

ever lived and she transformed our

understanding of what literature could

do
thanks for watching

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