All of my life is doing something for somebody else, whether I'm being a good daughter, a good mother, a good wife, a good lover, a good teacher -- and that's all that. The only thing I do for me is writing. That's really the real free place where I don't have to answer.

Toni Morrison

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If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.

Toni Morrison

getting-things-done giving-up want

There 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 Morrison

self writing civilization

It's important, therefore, to know who the real enemy is, and to know the function, the very serious function of racism, which is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining over and over again, your reason for being. Somebody says you have no language and so you spend 20 years proving that you do. Somebody says your head isn't shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Someone says you have no art so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdoms and so you dredge that up. None of that is necessary. There will always be one more thing.

Toni Morrison

racism years art

If there's a book you really want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.

Toni Morrison

attitude happiness inspirational

There is no such thing as race. None. There is just a human race - scientifically, anthropologically. Racism is a construct, a social construct... it has a social function, racism.

Toni Morrison

racism race social

I know the world is bruised and bleeding, and though it is important not to ignore its pain, it is also critical to refuse to succumb to its malevolence. Like failure, chaos contains information that can lead to knowledge - even wisdom. Like art.

Toni Morrison

pain important art

Don’t beg anybody for anything, especially love.

Toni Morrison

humiliation self-respect love

The function of freedom is to free someone else.

Toni Morrison

revolutionary responsibility love

Books ARE a form of political action. Books are knowledge. Books are reflection. Books change your mind.

Toni Morrison

political reflection book

Freedom is choosing your responsibility. It's not having no responsibilitie s; it's choosing the ones you want.

Toni Morrison

responsibility want

Racism will disappear when it's no longer profitable, and no longer psychologically useful. And when that happens, it'll be gone. But at the moment, people make a lot of money off of it, pro and con.

Toni Morrison

racism gone people

Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence; does more than represent the limits of knowledge; it limits knowledge.

Toni Morrison

black limits doe

Please don't settle for happiness. It's not good enough. Of course you deserve it, but if that's all you have in mind - happiness - I want to suggest to you that personal success devoid of meaningfulness, free of a steady commitment to social justice - that's more than a barren life. It's a trivial one.

Toni Morrison

not-good-enough justice commitment

In times of dread, artists must never choose to remain silent.

Toni Morrison

dread silent artist

I tell my students, 'When you get these jobs that you have been so brilliantly trained for, just remember that your real job is that if you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else. This is not just a grab-bag candy game.

Toni Morrison

freedom real jobs

The peace I am thinking of is the dance of an open mind when it engages another equally open one.

Toni Morrison

tolerance diversity thinking

Your life is already artful-waiting, just waiting, for you to make it art.

Toni Morrison

waiting-for-you waiting art

She is a friend of mind. She gather me, man. The pieces I am, she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order. It's good, you know, when you got a woman who is a friend of your mind.

Toni Morrison

real-friends friendship men

Don't ever think I fell for you, or fell over you. I didn't fall in love, I rose in it.

Toni Morrison

love fall thinking

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.

Toni Morrison

thank-you beauty life