Toni Morrison RIP

RIP, a giant among all of us.

“We die,” Morrison closed her Nobel Prize address. “That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.”
RIP to an immeasurable writer.

A woman who truly lived in the power of words. RIP

Her books have been waiting for me on my shelf for way too long. I know what I'll read next. RIP.

I hardly know what to say here. Toni Morrison's death seems too improbable to be a reality. There are those we think will always be here to touch us, to guide and show us what it is to be human, to be a woman in this world. For me, Toni Morrison and her books meant that . . . as did Ursula LeGuin and hers.

I haven't yet processed this—and I don't know when I will—so I can't express what I would like.

Toni Morrison not only changed the way I write, she changed the way I thought about writing. RIP.

They reran a special on about her and her work on PBS yesterday.

New documentary presents Toni Morrison in her own words - Jul 5, 2019

I heard an interview with her a while back on public radio. In addition to being an amazing writer, she was a fascinating and brilliant person. RIP.

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

I came in here to post a thread if there wasn't one already. All blessings on the soul of one writer who touched mine.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

I could never get into her books. RIP, Ms. Morrison.

Toni Morrison was first, and foremost, a writer. Not a female writer or a Black writer. A writer. A writer who wrote about Blackness and being female and being both in a dangerous world that will destroy because you are both.

And I wasn't a big fan of her writing. Boom. Yeah, I said what I said. Not. A. Fan.

Why? Well, have you ever heard of the phrase, "Easy reading comes from hard writing?"

Toni Morrison did not make for easy reading. It was hard writing and harder reading. Some writers are that way. They don't dumb it down or water it down or make it easy. They put in the work to write something like Jazz or Sula or The Bluest Eye or Song of Solomon or Beloved and they make the reader to put in the work to figure it all out. I have no doubt had she wanted to, Toni Morrison could have written easy readers. She just didn't want to. Easy was boring to someone as brilliant as Toni Morrison.

Much in the same way Miles Davis wasn't all that interested in making easy music. He left that to others. There's a famous story,

Kenny G was on the road with Miles Davis for many months at a time. According to Kenny G, Davis didn’t talk much, but he did teach Kenny G a big lesson. They were playing at Lincoln Center, two shows in one night. Kenny G opened the first show, then between shows, Davis paid him a visit.


“[Davis] comes into my dressing room, says, 'Man that was great. You were great. I’m going to open for you second show.’ I’m thinking to myself, ‘Yeah, you know what, I’ve made it.’ By the time I got on stage it was midnight. Out of 3,000 people, there were about 100 left,” laughed Kenny G. “That guy knew what he was doing. He just didn’t want to stay there late.” Kenny G said as an opening act, that’s what happens. “Pay your dues and you get your chance later."

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Toni Morrison paid her dues. The way Baldwin paid his dues and Angelou paid her dues. We're all writers here and we've all got dues to pay. Some of us are all paid up. Some of us are just getting stated, but there's really no other way to do it. If you want to get your chance you got to pay your dues.

My wife owns all the Toni Morrison books in the house. They're packed away in the basement. We ran out of room in the bookcases years ago. I don't know if I'll suddenly get the urge to find that box and unpack it and start reading The Bluest Eye. I kinda doubt it. I realized early on that simply because someone is acclaimed doesn't mean I'm going to dig their shit. I liked Leonard Cohen's songs, but I didn't like Leonard Cohen singing his songs. Same goes for Bob Dylan or Cecil Taylor or Akira Kurosawa or Kurt Cobain or Friends. More than one thing can be true. You can be brilliant at what you do, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna dig your brilliance.

The thing is I don't believe I have to read Toni Morrison to know Toni Morrison was a great writer and one of the most important ones of this or any other generation. She once called the essayist Ta-Neshi Coates the successor to James Baldwin (and royally pissed off a butt-hurt Cornel West by doing so), and when she said it that had gravitas.

When you got that do you really need me to carry around one of your books to look like I'm hip and into something I'm not? Toni Morrison doesn't need my validation. Not in this life or in the next.

But she gets it anyway. Rest in Power.