Toni Morrison citáty
Toni Morrison
Datum narození: 18. únor 1931
Datum úmrtí: 5. srpen 2019
Toni Morrisonová, vlastním jménem Chloe Anthony Wofford [nenalezeno v uvedeném zdroji] byla americká spisovatelka, redaktorka a profesorka. V roce 1993 obdržela Nobelovu ceny za literaturu. Její knihy jsou známy díky užívání epických témat, živých dialogů a propracovaných charakteristik postav afroamerického původu. Mezi její nejznámější knihy patří Velmi modré oči, Píseň o Šalamounovi nebo Milovaná, za kterou získala v roce 1988 Pulitzerovu cenu. Americkým časopisem s názvem Ladies' Home Journal byla vybrána mezi třicet nejmocnějších žen v Americe.
Citáty Toni Morrison
„Pokud víte o knize, kterou byste si rádi přečetli, ale ještě ji nikdo nenapsal, musíte ji napsat sami.“
Zdroj: [Schnakenberg, Robert, 2010, Tajné životy slavných spisovatelů, Knižní klub, 1, 270, 978-80-242-2598-2]
„Anybody white could take your whole self for anything that came to mind. Not just work, kill, or maim you, but dirty you. Dirty you so bad you couldn't like yourself anymore. And though she and others lived through and got over it, she could never let it happen to her own. The best things she was, was her children. Whites might dirty her all right, but not her best thing, her beautiful, magical best thing — the part of her that was clean.“
— Toni Morrison, kniha Beloved
Zdroj: Beloved (1987), Ch. 26
„Perhaps that's what all human relationships boil down to: Would you save my life? or would you take it?“
— Toni Morrison, kniha Song of Solomon
Zdroj: Song of Solomon
„Freeing yourself was one thing, claiming ownership of that freed self was another.“
— Toni Morrison, kniha Beloved
Zdroj: Beloved (1987)
Kontext: Bit by bit, at 124 and in the Clearing, along with others, she had claimed herself. Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another. <!-- ~ Ch. 9
„At some point in life the world's beauty becomes enough. You don't need to photograph, paint or even remember it. It is enough. No record of it needs to be kept and you don't need someone to share it with or tell it to. When that happens — that letting go — you let go because you can.“
— Toni Morrison, kniha Tar Baby
Tar Baby (1981)
„Like any artist with no art form, she became dangerous.“
— Toni Morrison, kniha Sula
Zdroj: Sula (1973)
„Beloved, you are my sister, you are my daughter, you are my face; you are me.“
— Toni Morrison, kniha Beloved
Beloved (1987)
Kontext: Beloved, you are my sister, you are my daughter, you are my face; you are me. <!-- ~ Ch. 22
„There is just a little music, each other and the urgency of what is at stake. Which is all they had. For that work, the work of language is to get out of the way.“
"Unspeakable Things Unspoken: The Afro-American Presence in American Literature" in Michigan Quarterly Review 28, no. 1 (Winter 1989)
Kontext: Beginning Beloved with numerals rather than spelled out numbers, it was my intention to give the house an identity separate from the street or even the city... Numbers here constitute an address, a thrilling enough prospect for slaves who had owned nothing, least of all an address. And although the numbers, unlike words, can have no modifiers, I give these an adjective — spiteful… A few words have to be read before it is clear that 124 refers to a house … and a few more have to be read to discover why it is spiteful, or rather the source of the spite. By then it is clear, if not at once, that something is beyond control, but is not beyond understanding since it is not beyond accommodation by both the "women" and the "children." The fully realized presence of the haunting is both a major incumbent of the narrative and sleight of hand. One of its purposes is to keep the reader preoccupied with the nature of the incredible spirit world while being supplied a controlled diet of the incredible political world. … Here I wanted the compelling confusion of being there as they (the characters) are; suddenly, without comfort or succor from the "author," with only imagination, intelligence, and necessity available for the journey. …. No compound of houses, no neighborhood, no sculpture, no paint, no time, especially no time because memory, pre-historic memory, has no time. There is just a little music, each other and the urgency of what is at stake. Which is all they had. For that work, the work of language is to get out of the way.
