Chloe Anthony Wofford Morrison also known as Toni Morrison was an award-winning novelist, children’s writer, and professor. She became a notable figure in African American history due to the efforts she made to promote Africa’s heritage and racial equality through her novels. She was born to Ramah and George Wofford on February 18, 1931, and they gave her the name Chloe Wofford Morrison at birth. She later got the baptismal name Anthony (Toni for short) at 12 when she joined the catholic denomination. The black family lived in Loraine, Ohio and Morrison’s parents ensured they inculcated cultural heritage and values in her. They told her stories on African American history and she read extensively as a child. Morrison’s parents enrolled her in Loraine, Ohio high school where she engaged in extracurricular activities like being a member of the debate team, and drama club. After graduating from high school, she attended Howard University in Washington DC. But unfortunately, Howard was the first place where Morrison experienced racial discrimination. She graduated with a B.A. in English in 1953 and then went to Cornell College for her master’s degree in 1955.
If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.
Toni Morrison
After graduation, she began to teach English at Texas Southern University. She later went back to Howard University and taught there for seven years during which time she met her husband, Harold Morrison. The couple had their first child in 1961 but when Morrison was pregnant with their second child they divorced in 1964. After the divorce, Morrison worked as an editor for the textbook division at Random House located in Syracuse, New York. She later moved to Random House in New York City to work in the fiction sector as the senior editor. Morrison used her position to bring black literature to light. One of her works was the famous “Contemporary African Literature” in 1972. The literature included the works of renowned black writers like Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe from Nigeria and Athol Fugard from South Africa. Morrison joined a small group that shared a common interest with her in poetry and writing, they discussed and told stories to one another. In one of their meetings, they discussed a black girl who desired so much to have blue eyes, and this inspired Morrison’s first novel “The Bluest Eye” at age 39. The book did not attract too many sales immediately but City University, New York, and other colleges included it on the reading list for their newly formed Black Studies department which increased sales. She wrote her second book “Sula” in 1973 and then the third “Songs of Solomon” in 1977 which became one of the first books in black history to be selected by the “Book of the Month Club”.
I want to discourage you from choosing anything or making any
Toni Morrison
decision simply because it is safe. Things of value seldom are
Morrison’s writing career blossomed and she began to gain national recognition. One of her greatest works was “Beloved” which talked about a slave who thought about killing her children instead of watching them become slaves. This excellent novel earned her the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988 and several other literary awards and was acted in a movie ten years later that featured Oprah Winfrey. By 1989, Morrison was a professor at Princeton University, and she continued to write more novels. She won a Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993 and became the first woman in African American history to receive such an honor. On August 5, 2019, Morrison died at 88 in Montefiore Medical Center, New York, and in 2020, she was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame.