Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison was born Chloe Ardelia Wofford,{{Cite book|last=Duvall|first=John N.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iHbeC1I_aWUC&pg=PA38|title=The Identifying Fictions of Toni Morrison: Modernist Authenticity and Postmodern Blackness|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|year=2000|isbn=978-0312234027|page=38|quote=After all the published biographical information on Morrison agrees that her full name is Chloe Anthony Wofford, so that the adoption of 'Toni' as a substitute for 'Chloe' still honors her given name, if somewhat obliquely. Morrison's middle name, however, was not Anthony; her birth certificate indicates her full name as Chloe Ardelia Wofford, which reveals that Ramah and George Wofford named their daughter for her maternal grandmother, Ardelia Willis.}} the second of four children from a working-class, Black family, in Lorain, Ohio, to Ramah (née Willis) and George Wofford.{{cite news| last = Dreifus |first=Claudia |author-link=Claudia Dreifus |title=Chloe Wofford Talks about Toni Morrison|newspaper=The New York Times|date=September 11, 1994 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1994/09/11/magazine/chloe-wofford-talks-about-toni-morrison.html|access-date=March 24, 2025}} Her mother was born in Greenville, Alabama, and moved north with her family as a child. She was a homemaker and a devout member of the African Methodist Episcopal Church.{{cite magazine |url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/10/27/ghosts-in-the-house |title=Ghosts in the House: How Toni Morrison Fostered a Generation of Black Writers |first=Hilton|last=Als |author-link=Hilton Als|ref=none|date=October 27, 2003 |magazine=The New Yorker|access-date=May 1, 2017}} George Wofford grew up in Cartersville, Georgia. When Wofford was about 15 years old, a group of white people lynched two African-American businessmen who lived on his street. Morrison later said: "He never told us that he'd seen bodies. But he had seen them. And that was too traumatic, I think, for him."{{cite magazine|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/12/magazine/the-radical-vision-of-toni-morrison.html |title=The Radical Vision of Toni Morrison |last=Ghansah|first=Rachel Kaadzi|author-link=Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah|date=April 8, 2015|magazine=The New York Times Magazine|access-date=April 29, 2017}} Soon after the lynching, George Wofford moved to the racially integrated town of Lorain, Ohio, in the hope of escaping racism and securing gainful employment in Ohio's burgeoning industrial economy. He worked odd jobs and as a welder for U.S. Steel. In a 2015 interview Morrison said that her father, traumatized by his experiences of racism, hated whites so much he would not let them in the house.{{cite news |title=Toni Morrison Remembers |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b062mp6k |date=Summer 2015|access-date=January 24, 2021|publisher=BBC}}

When Morrison was about two years old, her family's landlord set fire to the house in which they lived, while they were home, because her parents could not afford to pay rent. Her family responded to what she called this "bizarre form of evil" by laughing at the landlord rather than falling into despair. Morrison later said her family's response demonstrated how to keep your integrity and claim your own life in the face of acts of such "monumental crudeness".{{cite news |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1993/10/08/the-laureatess-life-song/10d3b79b-52f2-4685-a6dd-c57f7dde08d2/ |title=The Laureates's Life Song|last=Streitfeld|first=David|author-link=David Streitfeld|date=October 8, 1993 |newspaper=The Washington Post|access-date=April 29, 2017}}

Morrison's parents instilled in her a sense of heritage and language through telling traditional African-American folktales, ghost stories, and singing songs.{{cite book |title=Contemporary Popular Writers |publisher=St. James Press |year=1997 |isbn=978-1558622166 |editor-last=Mote |editor-first=Dave |location=Detroit |chapter=Toni Morrison}} She read frequently as a child; among her favorite authors were Jane Austen and Leo Tolstoy.{{cite news| last = Larson| first = Susan |title=Awaiting Toni Morrison |work=The Times-Picayune |date=April 11, 2007 |url=http://www.nola.com/living/t-p/index.ssf?/base/living-8/1176268522309540.xml&coll=1 |publisher=NOLA.com |access-date=June 11, 2007 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070930181626/http://www.nola.com/living/t-p/index.ssf?%2Fbase%2Fliving-8%2F1176268522309540.xml&coll=1 |archive-date = September 30, 2007 }}

Morrison became a Catholic at the age of 12{{Cite web|url=https://lithub.com/on-the-paradoxes-of-toni-morrisons-catholicism/|title=On the Paradoxes of Toni Morrison's Catholicism|first=Nick|last=Ripatrazone|website=Literary Hub|date=March 2, 2020|access-date=February 28, 2022}} and took the baptismal name Anthony (after Anthony of Padua), which led to her nickname, Toni.{{cite news |title=Toni Morrison: 'I want to feel what I feel. Even if it's not happiness' |author-link=Emma Brockes |first=Emma |last=Brockes |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/apr/13/toni-morrison-home-son-love |newspaper=The Guardian |date=April 13, 2012 |access-date=February 14, 2013}} Attending Lorain High School, she was on the debate team, the yearbook staff, and in the drama club.

In 1949, she enrolled at Howard University in Washington, D.C., seeking the company of fellow Black intellectuals.{{cite news|url=http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/i-didnt-want-to-come-back-toni-morrison-on-life-death-and-desdemona-20150803-giqaxu.html|title='I didn't want to come back': Toni Morrison on life, death and Desdemona|last=Cummings|first=Pip|date=August 7, 2015|newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald|access-date=May 3, 2017}} She was the first person in her family to attend college, meaning that she was a first-generation college student.{{Cite web |title=Toni Morrison: Toni Morrison: Biographical Note |url=https://scalar.lehigh.edu/toni-morrison/toni-morrison-biographical-note |access-date=2024-10-28 |website=Toni Morrison: A Teaching and Learning Resource Collection |language=en}} Initially a student in the drama program at Howard, she studied theatre with celebrated drama teachers Anne Cooke Reid and Owen Dodson.{{cite book|title=Toni Morrison: Memory and Meaning|editor=Adrienne Lanier Seward, Justine Tally|publisher=University Press of Mississippi|isbn=9781626742048|first=Dana A. |last=Williams|chapter=To Make A Humanist Black: Toni Wofford's Howard Years|date=August 12, 2014 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7v4aBwAAQBAJ&pg=PT43}} It was while at Howard that she encountered racially segregated restaurants and buses for the first time. She graduated in 1953 with a B.A. in English and a minor in Classics, and was able to work with key members of the Harlem Renaissance era such as Alain Locke and Sterling Brown. Additionally, she participated in the university's theater group, known as the Howard Players, where she had the opportunity to travel the Deep South, which was a defining experience of her life.{{Cite book |last=Roynon |first=Tessa |title=The Cambridge introduction to Toni Morrison |date=2013 |publisher=Cambridge University press |isbn=978-1-107-00391-0 |series=Cambridge introductions to literature |location=Cambridge}}

Morrison went on to earn a Master of Arts degree in 1955 from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.{{Cite web|last=Wilensky|first=Joe|date=August 6, 2019|title=Literary icon Toni Morrison, M.A. '55, dies at 88|url=https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2019/08/literary-icon-toni-morrison-ma-55-dies-88|access-date=December 13, 2019|website=Cornell Chronicle|language=en}} Her master's thesis was titled "Virginia Woolf's and William Faulkner's treatment of the alienated".{{Cite book|last1=Wofford|first1=Chloe Ardellia|title=Virginia Woolf's and William Faulkner's Treatment of the Alienated|date=September 1955|url=https://newcatalog.library.cornell.edu/catalog/1152836|publisher=Cornell University|access-date=March 5, 2016}} She taught English, first at Texas Southern University in Houston from 1955 to 1957, and then at Howard University for the next seven years. While teaching at Howard, she met Harold Morrison, a Jamaican architect, whom she married in 1958. Their first son was born in 1961 and she was pregnant with their second son when she and Harold divorced in 1964.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/apr/25/toni-morrison-books-interview-god-help-the-child|title=Toni Morrison: 'I'm writing for black people ... I don't have to apologize'|last=Hoby|first=Hermione|author-link=Hermione Hoby|date=April 25, 2015|newspaper=The Guardian|access-date=April 29, 2017}}{{cite book |last=Gillespie |first=Carmen |title=Critical Companion to Toni Morrison: A Literary Reference to Her Life and Work |publisher=Infobase Publishing |year=2007 |isbn=978-1438108575 |page=6}}

After her divorce and the birth of her son Slade in 1965, Morrison began working as an editor for L. W. Singer, a textbook division of publisher Random House, in Syracuse, New York. Two years later, she transferred to Random House in New York City, where she became their first Black woman senior editor in the fiction department.[http://www.biography.com/people/toni-morrison-9415590 "Toni Morrison Biography"], Bio.com, April 2, 2014. Retrieved October 31, 2015.{{cite news |last=Grimes |first= William |title=Toni Morrison Is '93 Winner of Nobel Prize in Literature |newspaper=The New York Times |date=October 8, 1993 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/98/01/11/home/28957.html |access-date =June 11, 2007}}

In that capacity, Morrison played a vital role in bringing Black literature into the mainstream. One of the first books she worked on was the groundbreaking Contemporary African Literature (1972), a collection that included work by Nigerian writers Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe, and South African playwright Athol Fugard. She fostered a new generation of Afro-American writers, including poet and novelist Toni Cade Bambara, radical activist Angela Davis, Black Panther Huey Newton{{cite web|url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-07/toni-morrison-nobel-prize-winning-author-dies-at-88/11390016|title=Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison dies at 88|date=August 7, 2019|website=ABC News|access-date=August 7, 2019}} and novelist Gayl Jones, whose writing Morrison discovered. She also brought to publication the 1975 autobiography of the outspoken boxing champion Muhammad Ali, The Greatest: My Own Story. In addition, she published and promoted the work of Henry Dumas,{{cite journal | last=Morrison | first=Toni | jstor=2904523 | title=On behalf of Henry Dumas | journal=Black American Literature Forum | volume=22 | issue=2 | date=Summer 1988 | pages=310–312 | doi=10.2307/2904523 | issn=0148-6179 }} a little-known novelist and poet who in 1968 had been shot to death by a transit officer in the New York City Subway.{{cite news| last = Verdelle| first = A. J. | title = Paradise found: a talk with Toni Morrison about her new novel – Nobel Laureate's new book, 'Paradise' – Interview| magazine = Essence| date = February 1998| url= http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1264/is_n10_v28/ai_20187690/pg_2| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130811053111/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1264/is_n10_v28/ai_20187690/pg_2| url-status = dead| archive-date = August 11, 2013| access-date =June 11, 2007 | df=mdy-all }}

Among other books that Morrison developed and edited is The Black Book (1974), an anthology of photographs, illustrations, essays, and documents of Black life in the United States from the time of slavery to the 1920s. Random House had been uncertain about the project but its publication met with a good reception. Alvin Beam reviewed the anthology for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, writing: "Editors, like novelists, have brain children{{snd}}books they think up and bring to life without putting their own names on the title page. Mrs. Morrison has one of these in the stores now, and magazines and newsletters in the publishing trade are ecstatic, saying it will go like hotcakes."

Morrison had begun writing fiction as part of an informal group of poets and writers at Howard University who met to discuss their work. She attended one meeting with a short story about a Black girl who longed to have blue eyes. Morrison later developed the story as her first novel, The Bluest Eye, getting up every morning at 4 am to write, while raising two children on her own.

File:Toni Morrison (The Bluest Eye author portrait).jpg of The Bluest Eye{{nbsp}}(1970)]]

The Bluest Eye was published by Holt, Rinehart, and Winston in 1970, when Morrison was aged 39. It was favorably reviewed in The New York Times by John Leonard, who praised Morrison's writing style as being "a prose so precise, so faithful to speech and so charged with pain and wonder that the novel becomes poetry ... But The Bluest Eye is also history, sociology, folklore, nightmare and music."{{cite news | last=Leonard | first=John|author-link=John Leonard (critic)| title=Books of the Times| newspaper=The New York Times | date=November 13, 1970 | url=https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/01/11/home/morrison-bluest.html |access-date=March 24, 2025| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190809092939/http://movies2.nytimes.com/books/98/01/11/home/morrison-bluest.html | archive-date=August 9, 2019 |url-status=live}} The novel did not sell well at first, but the City University of New York put The Bluest Eye on its reading list for its new Black studies department, as did other colleges, which boosted sales.{{cite web | title=Who Is the Author of Toni Morrison? | first=Boris | last=Kachka | work=New York | date=April 27, 2012 | url=http://nymag.com/news/features/toni-morrison-2012-5/ | access-date=August 7, 2019}} The book also brought Morrison to the attention of the acclaimed editor Robert Gottlieb at Knopf, an imprint of the publisher Random House. Gottlieb later edited all but one of Morrison's novels.

In 1975, Morrison's second novel Sula (1973), about a friendship between two Black women, was nominated for the National Book Award. Her third novel, Song of Solomon (1977), follows the life of Macon "Milkman" Dead III, from birth to adulthood, as he discovers his heritage. This novel brought her national acclaim, being a main selection of the Book of the Month Club, the first novel by a Black writer to be so chosen since Richard Wright's Native Son in 1940.Busby, Margaret (October 9, 1993), [https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/books-toni-morrison-beloved-and-all-that-jazz-margaret-busby-on-the-new-nobel-laureate-whose-wisdom-1509591.html "Books: Toni Morrison: beloved and all that jazz: Margaret Busby on the new Nobel laureate, whose wisdom can nourish us all"], The Independent. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190422035020/https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/books-toni-morrison-beloved-and-all-that-jazz-margaret-busby-on-the-new-nobel-laureate-whose-wisdom-1509591.html |date=April 22, 2019 }}. Song of Solomon also won the National Book Critics Circle Award.{{cite web|url=http://bookcritics.org/awards/past_awards|title=All Past National Book Critics Circle Award Winners and Finalists|publisher=National Book Critics Circle |access-date=August 6, 2019|archive-date=October 6, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191006045535/http://bookcritics.org/awards/past_awards/|url-status=dead}}

At its 1979 commencement ceremonies, Barnard College awarded Morrison its highest honor, the Barnard Medal of Distinction.{{cite web|url=http://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/columbia?a=d&d=cs20050518-01.2.32|title=Quindlen Tells Grads to Lead, Be Fearless |first=Megan|last=Greenwell|work=Columbia Daily Spectator |publisher=Columbia University Libraries|date=May 18, 2005|access-date=August 6, 2019 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200718101549/http://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=cs20050518-01&getpdf=true |archive-date= Jul 18, 2020 }}

Morrison gave her next novel, Tar Baby (1981), a contemporary setting. In it, a looks-obsessed fashion model, Jadine, falls in love with Son, a penniless drifter who feels at ease with being Black.

Resigning from Random House in 1983,{{cite web|url=https://lithub.com/why-toni-morrison-left-publishing |website=Literary Hub|title=Why Toni Morrison Left Publishing|first=Dan|last=Sinykin|date=October 24, 2023|access-date=October 30, 2023}} Morrison left publishing to devote more time to writing, while living in a converted boathouse on the Hudson River in Nyack, New York.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/12/26/nyregion/new-york-home-of-toni-morrison-burns.html |url-access=subscription |title=New York Home of Toni Morrison Burns|date=December 26, 1993|access-date=August 6, 2019|work=The New York Times|page=38}}{{cite news | last=Jaggi | first=Maya | author-link=Maya Jaggi | title=Solving the riddle | newspaper=The Guardian| date=November 14, 2003 | url=http://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/nov/15/fiction.tonimorrison | access-date=August 7, 2019}} She taught English at two branches of the State University of New York (SUNY) and at Rutgers University's New Brunswick campus.{{cite web|url=https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/a28622158/toni-morrison-death-obit-tribute/|title=Toni Morrison's Monumental Impact on Literature and Culture Will Be Felt For Centuries to Come|last=Westenfeld|first=Adrienne|date=August 6, 2019|website=Esquire|access-date=August 6, 2019}} In 1984, she was appointed to an Albert Schweitzer chair at the University at Albany, SUNY.{{cite news|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-06/toni-morrison-first-black-woman-writer-to-win-nobel-dies-at-88|title=Toni Morrison, First Black Woman Writer to Win Nobel, Dies|last=Henry|first=David|date=August 6, 2019|work=Bloomberg|access-date=August 6, 2019}}

Morrison's first play, Dreaming Emmett, is about the 1955 murder by white men of Black teenager Emmett Till. The play was commissioned by the New York State Writers Institute at the State University of New York at Albany, where she was teaching at the time. It was produced in 1986 by Capital Repertory Theatre and directed by Gilbert Moses.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1985/12/29/theater/toni-morrison-tries-her-hand-at-playwriting.html|title=Toni Morrison Tries Her Hand at Playwriting|first=Margaret |last=Croyden|date=December 29, 1985|work=The New York Times|access-date=May 1, 2017}} Morrison was also a visiting professor at Bard College from 1986 to 1988.{{Sfn|Fultz|2003|p=xii}}

File:Toni Morrison and sons.jpg

In 1987, Morrison published her most celebrated novel, Beloved. It was inspired by the true story of an enslaved African-American woman, Margaret Garner,{{cite news | last=Rothstein | first=Mervyn | title=Toni Morrison, in Her New Novel, Defends Women |newspaper=The New York Times| date=August 26, 1987 | url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/98/01/11/home/14013.html | access-date=June 20, 2016}} whose story Morrison had discovered when compiling The Black Book. Garner had escaped slavery but was pursued by slave hunters. Facing a return to slavery, Garner killed her two-year-old daughter but was captured before she could kill herself.{{cite web|url=http://www.blackpast.org/aah/margaret-garner-incident-1856|title=Margaret Garner Incident (1856)|date=December 5, 2007|publisher=Black Past|first=Casey|last=Nichols|access-date=April 29, 2017}} Morrison's novel imagines the dead baby returning as a ghost, Beloved, to haunt her mother and family.{{Cite journal|last=Mathieson|first=Barbara Offutt|date=1990|title=Memory and Mother Love in Morrison's Beloved|jstor=26303963|journal=American Imago|volume=47|issue=1|pages=1–21|issn=0065-860X}}

Beloved was a critical success and a bestseller for 25 weeks. The New York Times book reviewer Michiko Kakutani wrote that the scene of the mother killing her baby is "so brutal and disturbing that it appears to warp time before and after into a single unwavering line of fate".{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/04/01/nyregion/toni-morrison-s-novel-beloved-wins-the-pulitzer-prize-in-fiction.html|title=Toni Morrison's Novel Beloved Wins the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction|last=Hevesi|first=Dennis|date=April 1, 1988|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=April 29, 2017}} Canadian writer Margaret Atwood wrote in a review for The New York Times, "Ms. Morrison's versatility and technical and emotional range appear to know no bounds. If there were any doubts about her stature as a pre-eminent American novelist, of her own or any other generation, Beloved will put them to rest."{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1987/09/13/books/jaunted-by-their-nightmares.html|title=Jaunted By Their Nightmares |last=Atwood|first=Margaret|author-link=Margaret Atwood|date=September 13, 1987|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=May 1, 2017}}

Some critics panned Beloved. African-American conservative social critic Stanley Crouch, for instance, complained in his review in The New Republic{{cite magazine|url=http://rvannoy.asp.radford.edu/rvn/444/beloved.htm|title=Literary Conjure Woman|last=Crouch|first=Stanley|date=October 19, 1987|magazine=The New Republic|access-date=May 8, 2017}} that the novel "reads largely like a melodrama lashed to the structural conceits of the miniseries", and that Morrison "perpetually interrupts her narrative with maudlin ideological commercials".{{cite web|url=https://www.salon.com/control/1999/01/19/crouch_2/|title=The bull in the black-intelligentsia china shop|last=Alexander|first=Amy|author-link=Amy L. Alexander|date=January 19, 1999|website=Salon|access-date=May 8, 2017}}{{cite web|url=http://www.thenewcanon.com/beloved.html|title=Beloved by Toni Morrison|last=Gioia|first=Ted|author-link=Ted Gioia|publisher=thenewcanon.com|access-date=May 8, 2017}}

Despite overall high acclaim, Beloved failed to win the prestigious National Book Award or the National Book Critics Circle Award. Forty-eight Black critics and writers,{{cite news | title=48 Black Writers Protest By Praising Morrison | last=McDowell | first=Edwin | work=The New York Times | date=January 19, 1988 | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/19/books/48-black-writers-protest-by-praising-morrison.html | access-date=August 9, 2019}}{{cite web|url=http://aalbc.com/tc/index.php?/topic/1615-writers-demand-recognition-for-toni-morrison-1988/|title='Writers Demand Recognition for Toni Morrison (1988)', June Jordan Houston A. Baker Jr. Statement|date=July 27, 2012 |via=AALBC.com's Discussion Boards}} among them Maya Angelou, protested the omission in a statement that The New York Times published on January 24, 1988.{{cite news | title=Black Writers in Praise of Toni Morrison | work=The New York Times | date=April 8, 2018 | url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/98/01/11/home/15084.html | access-date=August 8, 2019 | department=Book Review}}{{cite news| last = Menand| first = Louis |author-link=Louis Menand| title = All That Glitters – Literature's global economy| magazine = The New Yorker| date = December 26, 2005| url = http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/12/26/051226crbo_books| access-date =June 11, 2007}} "Despite the international stature of Toni Morrison, she has yet to receive the national recognition that her five major works of fiction entirely deserve", they wrote. Two months later, Beloved won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. It also won an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award.

Beloved is the first of three novels about love and African-American history, sometimes called the Beloved Trilogy.{{cite web|url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6149.Beloved?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=lxA9AStsOO&rank=1|title=Beloved Trilogy #1 {{!}} Beloved

|publisher=goodreads.com|access-date=October 29, 2024}} Morrison said they are intended to be read together, explaining: "The conceptual connection is the search for the beloved – the part of the self that is you, and loves you, and is always there for you." The second novel in the trilogy, Jazz, came out in 1992. Told in language that imitates the rhythms of jazz music, the novel is about a love triangle during the Harlem Renaissance in New York City. According to Lyn Innes, "Morrison sought to change not just the content and audience for her fiction; her desire was to create stories which could be lingered over and relished, not 'consumed and gobbled as fast food', and at the same time to ensure that these stories and their characters had a strong historical and cultural base."{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/aug/06/toni-morrison-obituary|title=Toni Morrison obituary|first=Lyn|last=Innes|author-link=Lyn Innes|newspaper=The Guardian|date=August 6, 2019}}

In 1992, Morrison also published her first book of literary criticism, Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination (1992), an examination of the African-American presence in White American literature.{{cite web|url=http://www.anisfield-wolf.org/books/beloved/|title=Beloved|publisher=Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards |access-date=April 29, 2017}} (In 2016, Time magazine noted that Playing in the Dark was among Morrison's most-assigned texts on U.S. college campuses, together with several of her novels and her 1993 Nobel Prize lecture.){{cite magazine |last1=Johnson |first1=David |title=These Are the 100 Most-Read Female Writers in College Classes |url=https://time.com/4234719/college-textbooks-female-writers/ |magazine=Time |date=February 25, 2016}} Lyn Innes wrote in the Guardian obituary of Morrison, "Her 1990 series of Massey lectures at Harvard were published as Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination (1992), and explore the construction of a 'non-white Africanist presence and personae' in the works of Poe, Hawthorne, Melville, Cather and Hemingway, arguing that 'all of us are bereft when criticism remains too polite or too fearful to notice a disrupting darkness before its eyes'."

Before the third novel of the Beloved Trilogy was published, Morrison was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993. The citation praised her as an author "who in novels characterized by visionary force and poetic import, gives life to an essential aspect of American reality".{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1993/morrison-facts.html|title=Toni Morrison – Facts|publisher=nobelprize.org|access-date=April 29, 2017}} She was the first Black woman of any nationality to win the prize.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/08/06/toni-morrison-nobel-prize-terrifying-staircase-king-who-rescued-her/|title=Toni Morrison, the Nobel Prize, a terrifying staircase and the king who rescued her|last=Brockell|first=Gillian|date=August 6, 2019|newspaper=The Washington Post|access-date=August 6, 2019}} In her acceptance speech, Morrison said: "We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives."{{Cite web|date=October 30, 2020|title=Toni Morrison's Personal Library Is Now Available to Purchase|url=https://www.galeriemagazine.com/toni-morrison-library-for-sale/|first=Michelle Sinclair|last=Colman|access-date=November 16, 2020|website=Galerie|language=en-US}}

In her Nobel lecture, Morrison talked about the power of storytelling. To make her point, she told a story. She spoke about a blind, old, Black woman who is approached by a group of young people. They demand of her, "Is there no context for our lives? No song, no literature, no poem full of vitamins, no history connected to experience that you can pass along to help us start strong? ... Think of our lives and tell us your particularized world. Make up a story."{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1993/morrison-lecture.html|title=Toni Morrison – Nobel Lecture|publisher=nobelprize.org|date=December 7, 1993|access-date=April 29, 2017}}

In 1996, the National Endowment for the Humanities selected Morrison for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for "distinguished intellectual achievement in the humanities".[http://www.neh.gov/whoweare/jefflect.html Jefferson Lecturers] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111020121101/http://www.neh.gov///whoweare/jefflect.html |date=October 20, 2011 }} at NEH Website. Retrieved January 22, 2009. Morrison's lecture, entitled "The Future of Time: Literature and Diminished Expectations",Morrison, Toni, "The Future of Time, Literature and Diminished Expectations," reprinted in Toni Morrison, What Moves at the Margin: Selected Nonfiction (University Press of Mississippi, 2008), {{ISBN|978-1604730173}}, pp. 170–186. began with the aphorism: "Time, it seems, has no future." She cautioned against the misuse of history to diminish expectations of the future.Hawkins, B. Denise (June 16, 2007), [https://diverseeducation.com/article/7533/ "Marvelous Morrison – Toni Morrison – Award-Winning Author Talks About the Future From Some Place in Time"], Diverse Online (formerly Black Issues in Higher Education). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120512124851/http://www.diverseeducation.com/artman/publish/printer_7533.shtml |date=May 12, 2012}}. Morrison was also honored with the 1996 National Book Foundation's Medal of Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, which is awarded to a writer "who has enriched our literary heritage over a life of service, or a corpus of work".{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalbook.org/amerletters.html|title=National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, Presenter of National Book Awards|publisher=Nationalbook.org|access-date=May 30, 2012}}

The third novel of her Beloved Trilogy, Paradise, about citizens of an all-Black town, came out in 1997. The following year, Morrison was on the cover of Time magazine, making her only the second female writer of fiction and second Black writer of fiction to appear on what was perhaps the most significant U.S. magazine cover of the era.{{cite web|url=http://bookriot.com/2013/08/14/a-brief-history-of-novelists-on-the-cover-of-time/|title=A Brief History of (Novelists on the Cover of) Time|last=Corman|first=Josh|date=August 14, 2013|website=Book Riot|access-date=April 29, 2017}}

Also in 1998, the movie adaptation of Beloved was released, directed by Jonathan Demme and co-produced by Oprah Winfrey, who had spent ten years bringing it to the screen. Winfrey also stars as the main character, Sethe, alongside Danny Glover as Sethe's lover, Paul D, and Thandiwe Newton as Beloved.{{cite web|url=http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/beloved-1998|title=Beloved Movie Review & Film Summary (1998) |last=Ebert|first=Roger|author-link=Roger Ebert|website=www.rogerebert.com|date=October 16, 1998|access-date=April 29, 2017}}

The movie flopped at the box office. A review in The Economist opined that "most audiences are not eager to endure nearly three hours of a cerebral film with an original storyline featuring supernatural themes, murder, rape, and slavery".{{cite news|url=http://www.economist.com/node/177239|title=Beloved it's not|date=November 19, 1998|newspaper=The Economist|access-date=May 2, 2017}} Film critic Janet Maslin, in her New York Times review "No Peace from a Brutal Legacy", called it a "transfixing, deeply felt adaptation of Toni Morrison's novel. ... Its linchpin is of course Oprah Winfrey, who had the clout and foresight to bring 'Beloved' to the screen and has the dramatic presence to hold it together."{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1998/10/16/movies/film-review-no-peace-from-a-brutal-legacy.html|title=Film Review; No Peace From A Brutal Legacy|last=Maslin|first=Janet|author-link=Janet Maslin|date=October 16, 1998|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=May 2, 2017}} Film critic Roger Ebert suggested that Beloved was not a genre ghost story but the supernatural was used to explore deeper issues and the non-linear structure of Morrison's story had a purpose.

In 1996, television talk-show host Oprah Winfrey selected Song of Solomon for her newly launched Book Club, which became a popular feature on her Oprah Winfrey Show.{{cite web|url=http://www.oprah.com/oprahsbookclub/the-bluest-eye-by-toni-morrison|title=The Bluest Eye at Oprah's Book Club official page|publisher=Oprah.com}} An average of 13 million viewers watched the show's book club segments.{{Cite book |last=Lister |first=Rachel |title=Reading Toni Morrison |publisher=ABC-CLIO |year=2009 |isbn=978-0313354991 |page=113 |chapter=Toni Morrison and the Media |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LLpR_AEfSEsC&q=toni+morrison+appears+on+Oprah+winfrey&pg=PA113}} As a result, when Winfrey selected Morrison's earliest novel The Bluest Eye in 2000, it sold another 800,000 paperback copies. John Young wrote in the African American Review in 2001 that Morrison's career experienced the boost of "The Oprah Effect, ... enabling Morrison to reach a broad, popular audience."{{Cite journal|last=Young|first=John K.|date=January 1, 2001|title=Toni Morrison, Oprah Winfrey, and Postmodern Popular Audiences|url=http://mds.marshall.edu/english_faculty/16/|journal=African American Review|volume=35|issue=2|pages=181–204|doi=10.2307/2903252|jstor=2903252|url-access=subscription}}

Winfrey selected a total of four of Morrison's novels over six years, giving Morrison's works a bigger sales boost than they received from her Nobel Prize win in 1993.{{cite magazine|url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/maddieberg/2016/08/03/with-new-book-club-pick-oprah-has-still-got-the-golden-touch/|title=With New Book Club Pick, Oprah's Still Got the Golden Touch|last=Berg|first=Madeline|date=August 3, 2016|magazine=Forbes|access-date=May 2, 2017}} The novelist also appeared three times on Winfrey's show. Winfrey said, "For all those who asked the question 'Toni Morrison again?'... I say with certainty there would have been no Oprah's Book Club if this woman had not chosen to share her love of words with the world." Morrison called the book club a "reading revolution".

Morrison continued to explore different art forms, such as providing texts for original scores of classical music. She collaborated with André Previn on the song cycle Honey and Rue, which premiered with Kathleen Battle in January 1992, and on Four Songs, premiered at Carnegie Hall with Sylvia McNair in November 1994. Both Sweet Talk: Four Songs on Text and Spirits In the Well (1997) were written for Jessye Norman with music by Richard Danielpour, and, alongside Maya Angelou and Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Morrison provided the text for composer Judith Weir's woman.life.song commissioned by Carnegie Hall for Jessye Norman, which premiered in April 2000.{{cite web|url=https://classicalmusicindy.org/toni-morrison-in-classical-music/|title=Toni Morrison in Classical Music|first=Anna|last= Hinkley|website=Classical Music Indy|date=September 8, 2020|access-date=February 12, 2021}}{{cite web|url=http://honor.carnegiehall.org/honor/artists/artistDetail.aspx?art=tmorrison|title=Honor! A Celebration of the African American Cultural Legacy – Festival Artists – Toni Morrison|website=honor.carnegiehall.org|date=March 2009|access-date=August 6, 2019}}

Morrison returned to Margaret Garner's life story, the basis of her novel Beloved, to write the libretto for a new opera, Margaret Garner. Completed in 2002, with music by Richard Danielpour, the opera was premièred on May 7, 2005, at the Detroit Opera House with Denyce Graves in the title role.[http://www.margaretgarner.org/brown_normanrelease.html "Rising Opera Star Angela M. Brown to replace Jessye Norman in World Premiere Production of Margaret Garner"], Michigan Opera Theater, April 1, 2005. {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141029220805/http://www.margaretgarner.org/brown_normanrelease.html |date=October 29, 2014 }}. Love, Morrison's first novel since Paradise, came out in 2003. In 2004, she put together a children's book called Remember to mark the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision in 1954 that declared racially segregated public schools to be unconstitutional.{{cite magazine|url=https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/toni-morrison-cornel-west-politics/|title='We Better Do Something': Toni Morrison and Cornel West in Conversation|date=May 6, 2004|magazine=The Nation|access-date=April 7, 2023}}

From 1997 to 2003, Morrison was an Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University.{{cite web|url=http://adwhiteprofessors.cornell.edu/all-professors-at-large-1965-to-june-30-20222/|title=All Professors at Large 1965 to June 30, 2023|website=Cornell University|access-date=June 8, 2018}}

In 2004, Morrison was invited by Wellesley College to deliver the commencement address, which has been described as "among the greatest commencement addresses of all time and a courageous counterpoint to the entire genre".{{cite web|url=https://www.themarginalian.org/2015/07/21/toni-morrison-wellesley-commencement/|title=Toni Morrison on How to Be Your Own Story and Reap the Rewards of Adulthood in a Culture That Fetishizes Youth|first=Maria|last=Popova|website=The Marginalian|date=July 21, 2015|access-date=October 13, 2024}}

In June 2005, the University of Oxford awarded Morrison an honorary Doctor of Letters degree.{{Cite book |last=Morrison |first=Toni |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eV9_8v4pTzsC&pg=PR23 |title=Toni Morrison: Conversations |date=2008 |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |isbn=978-1604730197 |page=xxiii}}

In the spring 2006, The New York Times Book Review named Beloved the best work of American fiction published in the previous 25 years, as chosen by a selection of prominent writers, literary critics, and editors.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/ref/books/fiction-25-years.html|title=What Is the Best Work of American Fiction of the Last 25 Years?|date=May 21, 2006|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=May 1, 2017}} In his essay about the choice, "In Search of the Best", critic A. O. Scott said: "Any other outcome would have been startling since Morrison's novel has inserted itself into the American canon more completely than any of its potential rivals. With remarkable speed, 'Beloved' has, less than 20 years after its publication, become a staple of the college literary curriculum, which is to say a classic. This triumph is commensurate with its ambition since it was Morrison's intention in writing it precisely to expand the range of classic American literature, to enter, as a living Black woman, the company of dead White males like Faulkner, Melville, Hawthorne and Twain."{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/21/books/review/scott-essay.html|title=In Search of the Best|last=Scott|first=A. O.|author-link=A. O. Scott|date=May 21, 2006|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=May 1, 2017}}

In November 2006, Morrison visited the Louvre museum in Paris as the second in its "Grand Invité" program to guest-curate a month-long series of events across the arts on the theme of "The Foreigner's Home", about which The New York Times said: "In tapping her own African-American culture, Ms. Morrison is eager to credit 'foreigners' with enriching the countries where they settle."{{cite news|url=https://www.denverpost.com/2006/11/08/toni-morrison-puts-slam-poetry-in-louvre/|title=Toni Morrison puts slam poetry in Louvre|newspaper=The Denver Post|agency=Associated Press|date=November 8, 2006}}{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/21/books/21morr.html|title=Rap and Film at the Louvre? What's Up With That?|first=Alan |last=Riding|newspaper=The New York Times|date=November 21, 2006}}{{cite web|url=https://www.artnews.com/art-news/retrospective/toni-morrison-louvre-13088/|title=Toni Morrison on Looking for 'Wordless Forms' at the Louvre, in 2006: From the Archives|website=ARTnews|date=August 8, 2019|access-date=February 12, 2021}}

Morrison's novel A Mercy, released in 2008, is set in the Virginia colonies of 1682. Diane Johnson, in her review in Vanity Fair, called A Mercy "a poetic, visionary, mesmerizing tale that captures, in the cradle of our present problems and strains, the natal curse put on us back then by the Indian tribes, Africans, Dutch, Portuguese, and English competing to get their footing in the New World against a hostile landscape and the essentially tragic nature of human experience."{{cite magazine|url=http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2008/12/morrison200812|title=Voice of America|last=Johnson|first=Diane|magazine=Vanity Fair|date=December 2008|access-date=May 1, 2017}}

From 1989 until her retirement in 2006, Morrison held the Robert F. Goheen Chair in the Humanities at Princeton University. She said she did not think much of modern fiction writers who reference their own lives instead of inventing new material, and she used to tell her creative writing students, "I don't want to hear about your little life, OK?" Practicing what she preached, she chose not to write about her own life in a memoir or autobiography.

Though based in the Creative Writing Program at Princeton, Morrison did not regularly offer writing workshops to students after the late 1990s, a fact that earned her some criticism. Rather, she conceived and developed the Princeton Atelier, a program that brings together students with writers and performing artists. Together the students and the artists produce works of art that are presented to the public after a semester of collaboration.{{sfn|Gillespie|2007|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Qo5h9LqqanAC&q=morrison+princeton+atelier&pg=PA377 377]}}

File:Toni Morrison 2008-2.jpg

Inspired by her curatorship at the Louvre Museum, Morrison returned to Princeton in the fall 2008 to lead a small seminar, also entitled "The Foreigner's Home".

On November 17, 2017, Princeton University dedicated Morrison Hall (a building previously called West College) in her honor.{{cite web|url=https://www.princeton.edu/news/2017/11/20/princeton-dedicates-morrison-hall-honor-nobel-laureate-and-emeritus-faculty-member|last=Dienst|first=Karin|title=Princeton dedicates Morrison Hall in honor of Nobel laureate and emeritus faculty member Toni Morrison|publisher=Princeton University|date=November 20, 2017}}

In May 2010, Morrison appeared at PEN World Voices for a conversation with Marlene van Niekerk and Kwame Anthony Appiah about South African literature and specifically van Niekerk's 2004 novel Agaat.{{cite web |url=http://www.pen.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/4744/prmID/1984 |title=Toni Morrison and Marlene van Niekerk in Conversation with Anthony Appiah |work=PEN World Voices Festival |date=May 1, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121005064305/http://www.pen.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/4744/prmID/1984 |archive-date=October 5, 2012 }}

Morrison wrote books for children with her younger son, Slade Morrison, who was a painter and a musician. Slade died of pancreatic cancer on December 22, 2010, aged 45, when Morrison's novel Home (2012) was half-completed.

In May 2011, Morrison received an Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Rutgers University–New Brunswick. During the commencement ceremony,{{cite web |url=https://news.rutgers.edu/news-release/nobel-laureate-toni-morrison-speak-receive-honorary-degree-rutgers%E2%80%99-245th-commencement-may-15/20110208 |title=Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison to Speak, Receive Honorary Degree at Rutgers' 245th Commencement May 15 |work=Rutgers Today |date=February 8, 2011 }} she delivered a speech on the "pursuit of life, liberty, meaningfulness, integrity, and truth".

File:ToniMorrison WestPointLecture 2013.jpg

In 2011, Morrison worked with opera director Peter Sellars and Malian singer-songwriter Rokia Traoré on Desdemona, taking a fresh look at William Shakespeare's tragedy Othello. The trio focused on the relationship between Othello's wife Desdemona and her African nursemaid, Barbary, who is only briefly referenced in Shakespeare. The play, a mix of words, music and song, premiered in Vienna in 2011.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/26/arts/music/toni-morrisons-desdemona-and-peter-sellarss-othello.html|title=Toni Morrison's 'Desdemona' and Peter Sellars's 'Othello'|last=Sciolino|first=Elaine|date=October 25, 2011|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=May 3, 2017}}

Morrison had stopped working on her latest novel when her son died in 2010, later explaining, "I stopped writing until I began to think, He would be really put out if he thought that he had caused me to stop. 'Please, Mom, I'm dead, could you keep going ...?{{' "}}{{cite magazine|url=http://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/toni-morrison|first=Christopher|last= Bollen|title=Toni Morrison's Haunting Resonance|magazine=Interview|date=May 1, 2012|access-date=April 29, 2017}}

She completed Home and dedicated it to her son Slade.Minzesheimer, Bob (May 7, 2012), [https://archive.today/20141220213150/http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/books/news/story/2012-05-07/toni-morrison-home-books/54814002/1 "New novel 'Home' brings Toni Morrison back to Ohio"], USA Today.Mitra, Ipshita (May 14, 2014), [https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/books/features/Toni-Morrison-builds-a-Home-we-never-knew/articleshow/16463000.cms "Toni Morrison builds a 'Home' we never knew"], The Times of India. Published in 2012, it is the story of a Korean War veteran in the segregated United States of the 1950s who tries to save his sister from brutal medical experiments at the hands of a white doctor.

In August 2012, Oberlin College became the home base of the Toni Morrison Society,[https://www.tonimorrisonsociety.org/society.html "Society History"], The Toni Morrison Society. an international literary society founded in 1993, dedicated to scholarly research of Morrison's work.{{cite web|url=http://new.oberlin.edu/home/news-media/detail.dot?id=3873947|title=Oberlin College Establishes Partnership with Toni Morrison Society |publisher=Oberlin College|access-date=May 2, 2017|date=July 29, 2016 }}Communications Staff (September 18, 2013), [https://www.oberlin.edu/news/toni-morrison-society-celebrates-20-years "Toni Morrison Society Celebrates 20 Years"], Oberlin College.[http://www2.oberlin.edu/library/friends/perspectives/49.pdf "Morrison Society Office Dedicated"], Library Perspectives (newsletter of the Oberlin College Library), Fall 2013, no. 49, p. 5.

Morrison's eleventh novel, God Help the Child, was published in 2015. It follows Bride, an executive in the fashion and beauty industry whose mother tormented her as a child for being dark-skinned, a trauma that has continued to dog Bride.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/apr/29/god-help-the-child-toni-morrison-review-novel|title=God Help the Child by Toni Morrison review – 'incredibly powerful'|last=Gay|first=Roxane|author-link=Roxane Gay|date=April 29, 2015|newspaper=The Guardian|access-date=April 29, 2017}}

Morrison was a member of the editorial advisory board of The Nation, a magazine started in 1865 by Northern abolitionists.{{cite web|url=https://www.thenation.com/authors/toni-morrison/|title=Toni Morrison|website=The Nation|access-date=April 29, 2017|date=April 2, 2010}}

While teaching at Howard University from 1957 to 1964, she met Harold Morrison, a Jamaican architect, whom she married in 1958. She took his last name, and became known as Toni Morrison. Their first son, Harold Ford, was born in 1961. She was pregnant when she and Harold divorced in 1964. Her second son, Slade Kevin Morrison, was born in 1965; he died of pancreatic cancer on December 22, 2010,{{cite web |url=http://slademorrison.com/AboutArtist.html |title=About the Artist |author=Claudette |publisher=SladeMorrison.com |access-date=May 14, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110430073934/http://slademorrison.com/AboutArtist.html |archive-date=April 30, 2011}} when Morrison was halfway through writing her novel Home. She stopped work on the novel for a year or two before completing it; it was published in 2012.{{cite news |last=Cohen |first=Leah Hager |date=May 17, 2012 |title=Point of Return: Home, a Novel by Toni Morrison |newspaper=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/20/books/review/home-a-novel-by-toni-morrison.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 |access-date=February 19, 2024}}

Morrison died at Montefiore Medical Center in The Bronx, New York City, on August 5, 2019, from complications of pneumonia. She was 88 years old.{{cite news|last=Fox|first=Margalit|author-link=Margalit Fox|date=August 6, 2019|title=Toni Morrison, Towering Novelist of the Black Experience, Dies at 88|newspaper=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/06/books/toni-morrison-dead.html|access-date=August 6, 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://apnews.com/11910324b8c848af823a4b19a3e1bc7e|title=Nobel laureate Toni Morrison dead at 88|last=Italie|first=Hillel|date=August 6, 2019|website=AP NEWS|access-date=August 6, 2019}}{{cite news |last1=Lea |first1=Richard |first2=Sian |last2=Cain|title=Toni Morrison, author and Nobel laureate, dies aged 88 |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/aug/06/toni-morrison-author-and-pulitzer-winner-dies-aged-88 |newspaper=The Guardian|date=August 6, 2019|access-date= August 6, 2019}}

A memorial tribute was held on November 21, 2019, at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. Morrison was eulogized by, among others, Oprah Winfrey, Angela Davis, Michael Ondaatje, David Remnick, Fran Lebowitz, Ta-Nehisi Coates, and Edwidge Danticat.{{cite magazine|last=Hampton|first=Rachelle|date=November 22, 2019|url=https://slate.com/culture/2019/11/toni-morrison-eulogy-oprah-winfrey-ta-nehisi-coates.html |title='She Found Us in the Deserts of Ourselves'|magazine=Slate|publisher=The Slate Group

}} The jazz saxophonist David Murray performed a musical tribute.Di Corpo, Ryan (November 26, 2019), [https://www.americamagazine.org/arts-culture/2019/11/26/author-toni-morrison-honored-public-memorial "Author Toni Morrison Honored at Public Memorial"], America.

File:Vitoria - Graffiti & Murals 0392.JPG, Spain]]

Morrison spoke openly about American politics and race relations.

In writing about the 1998 impeachment of Bill Clinton, she claimed that since Whitewater, Bill Clinton was being mistreated in the same way Black people often are:

{{Blockquote | style=font-size:100% |Years ago, in the middle of the Whitewater investigation, one heard the first murmurs: white skin notwithstanding, this is our first black President. Blacker than any actual black person who could ever be elected in our children's lifetime. After all, Clinton displays almost every trope of blackness: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald's-and-junk-food-loving boy from Arkansas.Morrison, Toni (October 5, 1998). [http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1998/10/05/1998_10_05_031_TNY_LIBRY_000016504 "Talk of the Town: Comment"]. The New Yorker.}}

The phrase "our first Black president" was adopted as a positive by Bill Clinton supporters. When the Congressional Black Caucus honored the former president at its dinner in Washington, D.C., on September 29, 2001, for instance, Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), the chair, told the audience that Clinton "took so many initiatives he made us think for a while we had elected the first black president".{{cite book|title=Toni Morrison: A Biography|first=Stephanie|last=Li|publisher=ABC-CLIO|date=2010|isbn=978-0313378393|page=134}}

In the context of the 2008 Democratic Primary campaign, Morrison stated to Time magazine: "People misunderstood that phrase. I was deploring the way in which President Clinton was being treated, vis-à-vis the sex scandal that was surrounding him. I said he was being treated like a black on the street, already guilty, already a perp. I have no idea what his real instincts are, in terms of race."{{cite magazine|last=Sachs|first= Andrea|url=http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1738303,00.html |title=10 Questions for Toni Morrison|magazine=Time|date= May 7, 2008|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20080509001557/http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1738303,00.html|archive-date= May 9, 2008}} In the Democratic primary contest for the 2008 presidential race, Morrison endorsed Senator Barack Obama over Senator Hillary Clinton,{{cite web|url=http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/29/headlines |title=Headlines for January 29, 2008 – Sen. Kennedy Compares Barack Obama to JFK |work=Democracy Now! |date=January 29, 2008 |access-date=May 30, 2012}} though expressing admiration and respect for the latter.{{cite web | last=Alexander | first=Elizabeth | title=Our first black president? | website=Salon | date=January 28, 2008 | url=https://www.salon.com/2008/01/28/first_black_president/ | access-date=August 9, 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090913050344/http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/01/28/first_black_president/index.html | archive-date=September 13, 2009 | quote=It's worth remembering the context of Toni Morrison's famous phrase about Bill Clinton so we can retire it, now that Barack Obama is a contender}} When he won, Morrison said she felt like an American for the first time. She said, "I felt very powerfully patriotic when I went to the inauguration of Barack Obama. I felt like a kid."

In April 2015, speaking of the deaths of Michael Brown, Eric Garner and Walter Scott – three unarmed Black men killed by white police officers – Morrison said: "People keep saying, 'We need to have a conversation about race.' This is the conversation. I want to see a cop shoot a white unarmed teenager in the back. And I want to see a white man convicted for raping a Black woman. Then when you ask me, 'Is it over?', I will say yes."{{cite news |date=April 19, 2015 |first=Gaby |last=Wood |author-link=Gaby Wood|title=Toni Morrison interview: on racism, her new novel and Marlon Brando |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/authorinterviews/11532385/Toni-Morrison-interview-on-racism-her-new-novel-and-Marlon-Brando.html |newspaper=The Daily Telegraph |access-date=April 22, 2015}}

After the 2016 election of Donald Trump as President of the United States, Morrison wrote an essay, "Mourning for Whiteness", published in the November 21, 2016 issue of The New Yorker. In it she argues that white Americans are so afraid of losing privileges afforded them by their race that white voters elected Trump, whom she described as being "endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan", in order to keep the idea of white supremacy alive.{{cite magazine|url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/11/21/aftermath-sixteen-writers-on-trumps-america#anchor-morrison|title=Mourning For Whiteness|last=Morrison|first=Toni|date=November 21, 2016|magazine=The New Yorker|access-date=April 29, 2017}}{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/22/toni-morrison-decline-of-white-superiority-scared-/|title=Toni Morrison: Decline of 'white superiority' scared Americans into electing Donald Trump|last=Chasmar|first=Jessica|newspaper=The Washington Times|date=November 22, 2016|access-date=May 1, 2017|archive-date=August 9, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190809020946/https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/22/toni-morrison-decline-of-white-superiority-scared-/|url-status=dead}}

Although her novels typically concentrate on black women, Morrison did not identify her works as feminist. When asked in a 1998 interview, "Why distance oneself from feminism?" she replied: "In order to be as free as I possibly can, in my own imagination, I can't take positions that are closed. Everything I've ever done, in the writing world, has been to expand articulation, rather than to close it, to open doors, sometimes, not even closing the book – leaving the endings open for reinterpretation, revisitation, a little ambiguity."{{cite web|last=Jaffrey|first=Zia|url=http://www.salon.com/1998/02/02/cov_si_02int/|title=The Salon Interview – Toni Morrison|date=February 3, 1998|work=Salon|access-date=December 20, 2014}} She went on to state that she thought it "off-putting to some readers, who may feel that I'm involved in writing some kind of feminist tract. I don't subscribe to patriarchy, and I don't think it should be substituted with matriarchy. I think it's a question of equitable access, and opening doors to all sorts of things."

In 2012, she responded to a question about the difference between black and white feminists in the 1970s. "Womanists is what black feminists used to call themselves", she explained. "They were not the same thing. And also the relationship with men. Historically, black women have always sheltered their men because they were out there, and they were the ones that were most likely to be killed."

W. S. Kottiswari writes in Postmodern Feminist Writers (2008) that Morrison exemplifies characteristics of "postmodern feminism" by "altering Euro-American dichotomies by rewriting a history written by mainstream historians" and by her usage of shifting narration in Beloved and Paradise. Kottiswari states: "Instead of western logocentric abstractions, Morrison prefers the powerful vivid language of women of color ... She is essentially postmodern since her approach to myth and folklore is re-visionist."{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zVStc4m8euEC&q=toni+morrison+postmodern+feminist&pg=PA48|title=Postmodern Feminist Writers|last=Kottiswara|first=W. S.|publisher=Sarup & Sons|year=2008|location=New Delhi|pages=48–86|isbn=978-8176258210}}

Many of Morrison's works have been cited by scholars as significant contributions to Black feminism, reflecting themes of race, gender, and sexual identity within her narratives.{{Cite web |last=Hobson |first=Janell |date=2020-02-18 |title=How Black Feminist Scholars Remember Toni Morrison in the Classroom |url=https://msmagazine.com/2020/02/18/how-black-feminist-scholars-remember-toni-morrison-in-the-classroom/ |access-date=2024-11-03 |website=Ms. Magazine |language=en-US}}

Barbara Smith's 1977 essay "Toward a Black Feminist Criticism" argues that Morrison's Sula is a work of Black feminism, as it presents a lesbian perspective that challenges heterosexual relationships and the conventional family unit. Smith states, "Consciously or not, Morrison's work poses both lesbian and feminist questions about Black women's autonomy and their impact upon each other's lives."{{Cite journal |last=Smith |first=Barbara |date=1978 |title=Toward a Black Feminist Criticism|journal=Radical Teacher|issue=7 |pages=20–27 |jstor=20709102 |issn=0191-4847}}

Hilton Als's 2003 profile in The New Yorker notes that "Before the late sixties, there was no real Black Studies curriculum in the academy—let alone a post-colonial-studies program or a feminist one. As an editor and author, Morrison, backed by the institutional power of Random House, provided the material for those discussions to begin."{{Cite magazine |last=Als |first=Hilton|author-link=Hilton Als|ref=none|date=2003-10-19 |title=Toni Morrison and the Ghosts in the House |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/10/27/ghosts-in-the-house |access-date=2024-11-03 |magazine=The New Yorker}}

Morrison consistently advocated for feminist ideas that challenge the dominance of the white patriarchal system, frequently rejecting the notion of writing from the perspective of the "white male gaze".{{Cite web |last=Amin |first=Aisha |date=2020-06-23 |title=15 Toni Morrison Quotes about Race, Writing and Love|url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/15-toni-morrison-quotes-about-race-writing-and-love/14901/ |access-date=2024-11-03 |website=American Masters|publisher=PBS}} Feminist political activist Angela Davis notes that "Toni Morrison's project resides precisely in the effort to discredit the notion that this white male gaze must be omnipresent."{{Cite AV media |url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/toni-morrison-on-writing-without-the-white-gaze/14874/ |title=Toni Morrison on Writing Without the 'White Gaze'|website=American Masters|publisher=PBS|date=2020-06-18 |last=Polk |first=David|access-date=2024-11-03}}

In a 1998 episode of Charlie Rose, Morrison responded to a review of Sula, stating, "I remember a review of Sula in which the reviewer said, 'One day, she', meaning me, 'will have to face up 'to the real responsibilities, and get mature, 'and write about the real confrontation 'for black people, which is white people.' As though our lives have no meaning and no depth without the white gaze, and I have spent my entire writing life trying to make sure that the white gaze was not the dominant one in any of my books."{{YouTube|-Kgq3F8wbYA|Toni Morrison Beautifully Answers an 'Illegitimate' Question on Race}}, Charlie Rose, January 19, 1998

In a 2015 interview with The New York Times Magazine, Morrison reiterated her intention to write without the white gaze, stating, "What I'm interested in is writing without the gaze, without the white gaze. In so many earlier books by African-American writers, particularly the men, I felt that they were not writing to me. But what interested me was the African-American experience throughout whichever time I spoke of. It was always about African-American culture and people – good, bad, indifferent, whatever – but that was, for me, the universe."

Regarding the racial environment in which she wrote, Morrison stated, "Navigating a white male world was not threatening. It wasn't even interesting. I was more interesting than they were. I knew more than they did. And I wasn't afraid to show it."

In a 1986 interview with Sandi Russell, Morrison stated that she wrote primarily for Black women, explaining, "I write for black women. We are not addressing the men, as some white female writers do. We are not attacking each other, as both black and white men do. Black women writers look at things in an unforgiving/loving way. They are writing to repossess, re-name, re-own."{{Cite web|author=Irma McClaurin|date=2019-08-08 |title=Remembering Toni Morrison and the Passing of a Black and American Literary Genius |url=https://www.insightnews.com/aesthetics/features/remembering-toni-morrison-and-the-passing-of-a-black-and-american-literary-genius/article_2402cd94-b9fa-11e9-9411-5bcc25c2e19a.html |access-date=2024-11-03 |website=Insight News |language=en}}

In a 2003 interview, when asked about the labels "black" and "female" being attached to her work, Morrison replied, "I can accept the labels because being a black woman writer is not a shallow place but a rich place to write from. It doesn't limit my imagination; it expands it. It's richer than being a white male writer because I know more and I've experienced more."

In a 1987 article in The New York Times, Morrison argued for the greatness of being a Black woman, stating, "I really think the range of emotions and perceptions I have had access to as a black person and as a female person are greater than those of people who are neither. I really do. So it seems to me that my world did not shrink because I was a black female writer. It just got bigger."

File:Toni Morisson quote at National Memorial for Peace and Justice.jpg in Montgomery, Alabama]]

The National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, includes writing by Morrison.[https://eji.org/national-lynching-memorial "The National Memorial for Peace and Justice"], EJI (Equal Justice Initiative). Visitors can see her quote after they have walked through the section commemorating individual victims of lynching.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/museums/a-powerful-memorial-in-montgomery-remembers-the-victims-of-lynching/2018/04/24/3620e78a-471a-11e8-827e-190efaf1f1ee_story.html|title=A powerful memorial in Montgomery remembers the victims of lynching|last=Kennicott|first=Philip|date=April 24, 2018 | newspaper=The Washington Post | access-date=August 6, 2019}}

The Toni Morrison Papers are part of the permanent library collections of Princeton University, where they are held in the Manuscripts Division, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections.{{cite web|url=https://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S41/34/81I56/index.xml?section=topstories|title=Toni Morrison papers to reside at Princeton|date=October 17, 2014|publisher=Princeton University Office of Communication}}Skemer, Don, [https://www.princeton.edu/news/2016/06/08/toni-morrison-papers-open-students-scholars-princeton-university-library "Toni Morrison Papers open to students, scholars at Princeton University Library"], Princeton University, June 8, 2016. Morrison's decision to offer her papers to Princeton instead of to her alma mater Howard University was criticized by some within the historically black colleges and universities community.{{cite web | title=Do Toni Morrison's Papers Belong at Princeton or Howard? | work=The Huffington Post | first=Chris | last=Branch |url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/toni-morrison-papers-princeton-howard_n_6035026 | date=October 23, 2014 | access-date=August 7, 2019}}

Opening in February 2023, an exhibition titled Toni Morrison: Sites of Memory, which was curated from her archives at Princeton University, commemorated the 30th anniversary of her winning the Nobel Prize.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/28/arts/design/toni-morrison-princeton.html|title=Illuminating Toni Morrison's Manuscripts at Princeton|first= Hilarie M.|last=Sheets|newspaper=The New York Times|date=December 28, 2022}}{{cite web|url=https://www.princeton.edu/news/2023/01/24/princeton-will-explore-toni-morrisons-creative-process-abundance-exhibitions-and|title=Princeton is exploring Toni Morrison's creative process with an abundance of exhibitions and events|website=Princeton University|date=January 24, 2023|access-date=September 22, 2023}}{{cite web|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/04/30/1171897684/toni-morrisons-diary-entries-early-drafts-and-letters-are-on-display-at-princeto|title=Toni Morrison's diary entries, early drafts and letters are on display at Princeton|website=NPR|first=Neda|last=Ulaby|date=April 30, 2023|access-date=September 22, 2023}} Running from the week after her birthday until June 4, the exhibition featured rare manuscripts, correspondence between Morrison and others, and unfinished projects, taking its name from a 1995 essay by Morrison in which she spoke of a "journey to a site to see what remains were left behind and to reconstruct the world that these remains imply."{{cite web|url=https://www.blackcatholicmessenger.com/toni-morrison-exhibit-princeton-2023/|title=Toni Morrison exhibit opening in February at Princeton University|first=Nate|last=Tinner Williams|website=Black Catholic Messenger|date=January 3, 2023|access-date=September 22, 2023}}

File:Morrison Dining Hall, Cornell University.jpg

In 2007, [https://tme.lorainschools.org/ Toni Morrison Elementary School] opened in her hometown of Lorain, Ohio. In 2019, a resolution was passed in her hometown of Lorain, Ohio, to designate February 18, her birthday, as Toni Morrison Day. Additional legislation was introduced to also proclaim that date throughout the State of Ohio.Frazier, Charise (September 4, 2019), [https://madamenoire.com/1097594/toni-morrisons-hometown-declares-authors-birthday-as-toni-morrison-day/ "Toni Morrison's Hometown Declares Author's Birthday As 'Toni Morrison Day' "] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200213103500/https://madamenoire.com/1097594/toni-morrisons-hometown-declares-authors-birthday-as-toni-morrison-day/ |date=February 13, 2020 }}, MadameNoire.Joseph, Soraya (September 6, 2019), [https://thegrio.com/2019/09/06/toni-morrisons-birthday-recognized-as-toni-morrison-day-in-her-hometown/ "Toni Morrison's birthday recognized as 'Toni Morrison Day' in her hometown"], TheGrio.Woytach, Carissa (January 30, 2020), [https://chroniclet.com/news/199944/bill-designating-state-wide-toni-morrison-day-moves-forward/ "Bill designating state-wide Toni Morrison Day moves forward"], The Chronicle-Telegram. The legislation, HB 325, was passed by the Ohio House of Representatives on December 2, 2020,[https://fox8.com/news/toni-morrison-day-closer-to-reality-in-ohio-bill-now-awaiting-dewines-approval/ 'Toni Morrison Day' closer to reality in Ohio, bill now awaiting DeWine's approval], Fox8, December 2, 2020. and signed into law by Governor Mike DeWine on December 21.{{cite web|url=https://www.morningjournal.com/2020/12/21/dewine-signs-toni-morrison-day-bill/ |title=DeWine signs Toni Morrison Day bill|website=The Morning Journal|first=Jordana|last=Joy|date=December 21, 2020}}

In 2021, Cornell University opened Toni Morrison Hall, a 178,869 square-foot residence hall and Morrison Dining in 2022, an adjacent dining hall designed by ikon.5 Architects.{{cite web |title=3221-Toni Morrison Hall Facility Information |url=https://www.fs.cornell.edu/fs/facinfo/fs_facilinfo.cfm?facil_cd=3221 |website=Cornell University Facilities |publisher=Cornell University |access-date=15 July 2023}}{{cite web |last1=Wilensky |first1=Joe |title=On North Campus, New Buildings Shape Future of Undergrad Community |url=https://alumni.cornell.edu/cornellians/north-campus-new-buildings-shape-community/ |website=Cornellians |date=November 17, 2021 |publisher=Cornell University |access-date=15 July 2023}}

During December 2023, the Toni Morrison Collective at Cornell University to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Morrison's Nobel win partnered with Calvary Baptist Church to give away free copies of two of Morrison's books and hold book talks in various locations. As explained by Anne V. Adams, professor emerita of Africana studies and comparative literature and chair of the Toni Morrison Collective: "The fact that Toni Morrison, during her first year as a master's student, lodged at a house just a couple of doors up the street from historic Calvary Baptist Church created a perfect context for a collaboration."{{cite web|url=https://as.cornell.edu/news/toni-morrison-collective-hosts-book-talks-giveaways-during-december|title=Toni Morrison Collective hosts book talks, giveaways during December|first=Anne V.|last=Adams|website=Cornell University, College of Arts & Sciences|date=December 4, 2023|access-date=December 5, 2023}}

Morrison was interviewed by Margaret Busby in London for a 1988 documentary film by Sindamani Bridglal, entitled Identifiable Qualities, shown on Channel 4.Bridglal, S. L. (December 15, 2015), [https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/dec/27/the-day-i-had-tea-with-toni-morrison "Tea with Toni Morrison"], The Observer.[https://libguides.rutgers.edu/c.php?g=336816&p=2271988 "Videos on Literature and Philosophy: Literature in English, U.S."]. Rutgers University Libraries.

Morrison was the subject of a film titled Imagine – Toni Morrison Remembers, directed by Jill Nicholls and shown on BBC One television on July 15, 2015, in which Morrison talked to Alan Yentob about her life and work.[https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b062mp6k/imagine-summer-2015-4-toni-morrison-remembers Imagine: Toni Morrison Remembers], BBC One, Summer 2015.{{cite news | last=Mangan | first=Lucy |author-link=Lucy Mangan| title=Imagine: Toni Morrison Remembers review – proof of a divine being | newspaper=The Guardian| date=July 15, 2015 | url=http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/jul/15/imagine-toni-morrison-remembers-review | access-date=August 9, 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://www.newn.cam.ac.uk/newnham-news/8598/|title=Newnhamite director makes BBC programme about Nobel laureate Toni Morrison|date=July 16, 2015|publisher=Newnham College, University of Cambridge|access-date=August 7, 2019}}

In 2016, Oberlin College received a grant to complete a documentary film begun in 2014, The Foreigner's Home, about Morrison's intellectual and artistic vision,{{cite web|url=https://undertheduvetproductions.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/the-foreigners-home-a-feature-length-documentary-film-on-nobel-laureate-toni-morrison-2017-by-photojournalist-lisa-pacino/|title=The Foreigner's Home, a Feature-Length Documentary Film on Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison 2017 by Photojournalist Lisa Pacino|date=January 25, 2017|website=Under The Duvet Productions|access-date=April 29, 2017}} explored in the context of the 2006 exhibition she guest-curated at the Louvre.{{cite web|url=https://www.theforeignershome.com/|title=Toni Morrison at the Louvre|website=The Foreigner's Home|access-date=February 12, 2021}}{{cite web|url=http://canjournal.org/2019/11/toni-morrison-documentary-questions-what-it-means-to-be-a-foreigner/|title=Toni Torrison documentary questions what it means to be a foreigner|first=Brittany M. |last=Hudak|website=CAN Journal|publisher=Collective Arts Network|location=Cleveland|date=November 2019|access-date=February 12, 2021}} The film's executive producer was Jonathan Demme.{{cite web|url=https://videolibrarian.com/reviews/the-foreigners-home-toni-morrison-at-the-louvre/|title=The Foreigner's Home: Toni Morrison at the Louvre|website=Video Librarian|first=K. |last=Fennessy|date=December 19, 2018}} It was directed by Oberlin College Cinema Studies faculty Geoff Pingree and Rian Brown,{{cite web|url=http://www.rianbrown.com/the-foreigners-home/|title=The Foreigner's Home|website=Rian Brown|access-date=April 29, 2017}} and incorporates footage shot by Morrison's first-born son Harold Ford Morrison, who also consulted on the film.{{cite web|url=http://news.oberlin.edu/articles/cinema-studies-faculty-make-documentary-toni-morrison/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160421204301/http://news.oberlin.edu/articles/cinema-studies-faculty-make-documentary-toni-morrison/|url-status=dead|archive-date=April 21, 2016|title=Cinema Studies Faculty Make Documentary on Toni Morrison|date=April 21, 2016|website=News Center|access-date=April 29, 2017 | df=mdy-all }}

In 2019, Timothy Greenfield-Sanders' documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.{{cite web|url=https://variety.com/2019/film/reviews/toni-morrison-the-pieces-i-am-review-1203113802/|title=Film Review: 'Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am'|first=Nick|last=Schager|website=Variety|date=January 29, 2019|access-date=August 6, 2019}} Those featured in the film include Morrison, Angela Davis, Oprah Winfrey, Fran Lebowitz, Sonia Sanchez, and Walter Mosley, among others.{{cite web|url=https://filmthreat.com/reviews/toni-morrison-the-pieces-i-am/|title=Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am|last=Kikta|first=Lorry|date=April 14, 2019|website=Film Threat|access-date=August 6, 2019}}

• 1975: Ohioana Book Award for Sula{{cite web|url=http://www.ohioana.org/programs/ohioana-book-awards/past-award-winners/|title=Ohioana Book Award Winners|date=May 30, 2014 |publisher=Ohioana Library}}
• 1977: National Book Critics Circle Award for Song of Solomon{{cite web|url=http://www.bookcritics.org/awards/past_awards|title=National Book Critics Circle: awards|website=www.bookcritics.org|access-date=April 2, 2019|archive-date=August 1, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190801043800/http://bookcritics.org/awards/past_awards/|url-status=dead}}
• 1977: American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award{{Cite book|last=Goulimari|first=Pelagia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aiupAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA26|title=Toni Morrison|date=2012|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1136698682|page=26|author-link=Pelagia Goulimari}}
• 1981: Langston Hughes Medal, City College of New York
• 1982: Ohio Women's Hall of Fame inductee{{cite web |url=http://www.odjfs.state.oh.us/women/halloffame/bio.asp?ID=212 |title=Toni Morrison |publisher=Ohio Women's Hall of Fame |access-date=August 2, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924055221/http://www.odjfs.state.oh.us/women/halloffame/bio.asp?ID=212 |archive-date=September 24, 2015 |url-status=live}}
• 1986: New York State Governor's Arts Award{{cite news |last1=Goldfarb |first1=Ken |title=Proctor's Support Wins Governor's Arts Award |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TkJGAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA18 |access-date=15 March 2023 |newspaper=The Daily Gazette |date=February 13, 1986}}
• 1988: Robert F. Kennedy Book Award[http://rfkcenter.org/1988-qbelovedq-by-toni-morrison-and-qsong-in-a-weary-throatq-by-pauli-murray 8th Annual RFK Book Award] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220234526/http://rfkcenter.org/1988-qbelovedq-by-toni-morrison-and-qsong-in-a-weary-throatq-by-pauli-murray |date=December 20, 2014}}. Robert F. Kennedy Center.
• 1988: Helmerich Award{{cite web|url=http://helmerichaward.org/winners.php|title=Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award|website=helmerichaward.org|access-date=April 2, 2019}}
• 1988: American Book Award for Beloved{{cite web|url=http://www.beforecolumbusfoundation.com/american-book-awards/|title=American Book Awards|publisher=Before Columbus Foundation|access-date=April 2, 2019|archive-date=April 7, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190407160124/http://www.beforecolumbusfoundation.com/american-book-awards/|url-status=dead}}
• 1988: Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Race Relations for Beloved{{cite web|url=https://www.anisfield-wolf.org/winners/winners-by-year/|title=Winners by Year|website=Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards|access-date=April 2, 2019}}
• 1988: Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for Beloved
• 1988: Frederic G. Melcher Book Award for Beloved{{cite web|url=https://www.uua.org/books/award|title=Frederic G. Melcher Book Award|date=December 4, 2014|website=UUA.org|access-date=April 2, 2019|archive-date=April 2, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190402204617/https://www.uua.org/books/award|url-status=dead}}{{Efn|A remark in her acceptance speech that "there is no suitable memorial or plaque or wreath or wall or park or skyscraper lobby" honoring the memory of the human beings forced into slavery and brought to the United States – "There's no small bench by the road" – led the Toni Morrison Society to begin installing benches at significant sites in the history of slavery in America; the first "bench by the road" was dedicated July 26, 2008, on Sullivan's Island, South Carolina, the point of entry for about 40 percent of the enslaved Africans brought to Colonial America.{{cite web|url=https://www.uuworld.org/articles/a-bench-by-road|title=A bench by the road|date=August 11, 2008|website=UU World Magazine|access-date=April 2, 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/28/arts/design/28benc.html|title=Toni Morrison's on Sullivan's Island: A Bench of Memory at Slavery's Gateway|last=Lee|first=Felicia R.|date=July 28, 2008|work=The New York Times|access-date=April 2, 2019}}}}
• 1988: Honorary Doctor of Laws at University of Pennsylvania{{Cite web|url=https://almanac.upenn.edu/archive/v34pdf/n31/042688.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/https://almanac.upenn.edu/archive/v34pdf/n31/042688.pdf |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live|title=Almanac|date=April 26, 1988|access-date=August 12, 2019}}{{Cite web|url=https://secretary.upenn.edu/ceremonies/honorary-degree-recipients|author= Penn University Secretary|title= Honorary Degree Recipients|publisher= University of Pennsylvania|access-date=August 12, 2019}}
• 1989: Honorary Doctor of Letters at Harvard University{{cite web

| url = http://www.harvard.edu/on-campus/commencement/honorary-degrees

| title = Honorary Degrees

| website = harvard.edu

| publisher = Harvard University

| access-date = November 9, 2016

| quote = 1989 Benazir Bhutto, Toni Morrison LL.D.

| archive-date = October 15, 2019

| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20191015152434/https://www.harvard.edu/on-campus/commencement/honorary-degrees

| url-status = dead

}}

• 1993: Nobel Prize in Literature{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/|title=The Nobel Prize in Literature|website=NobelPrize.org|access-date=April 2, 2019}}
• 1993: Commander of the Arts and Letters, Paris
• 1994: Condorcet Medal, Paris{{Cite book |last=Fultz |first=Lucille P. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KgUhCI2w2eEC&pg=PR13 |title=Toni Morrison: Playing with Difference |date=2003 |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=978-0252028236 |page=xiii}}
• 1994: Rhegium Julii Prize for Literature{{Cite book |last=Matus |first=Jill L. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=d0T2_vT5G7cC&pg=PR14 |title=Toni Morrison |date=1998 |publisher=Manchester University Press |isbn=978-0719044489 |page=xiv}}
• 1996: Jefferson Lecture{{cite journal|url=https://www.chronicle.com/article/Toni-Morrison-to-Deliver-NEHs/96746|title=Toni Morrison to Deliver NEH's 1996 Jefferson Lecture|date=February 9, 1996|journal=The Chronicle of Higher Education|access-date=April 2, 2019|issn=0009-5982}}
• 1996: National Book Foundation's Medal of Distinguished Contribution to American Letters{{cite web|url=https://www.nationalbook.org/programs/dcal/|title=National Book Foundation – DCAL Medal|website=National Book Foundation|access-date=April 2, 2019}}
• 1997: Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Gustavus Adolphus College.{{cite web|url=https://gustavus.edu/events/nobelconference/nobelfoundation/degrees.php|title=Honorary Degrees – Nobel Conference|website=Gustavus Adolphus College|language=en|access-date=August 10, 2019}}
• 1998: Audie Award for Narration by the Author for Sula{{cite web|url=https://www.audiopub.org/1998-audies|title=1998 Audie Awards|website=Audio Publishers Association}}
• 2000: National Humanities Medal{{cite web|url=https://www.neh.gov/about/awards/national-humanities-medals/toni-morrison|title=Toni Morrison|website=National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)|access-date=April 2, 2019}}
• 2002: 100 Greatest African Americans, list by Molefi Kete AsanteAsante, Molefi Kete (2002). 100 Greatest African Americans: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books. {{ISBN|1573929638}}.
• 2005: Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement{{cite web|title= Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement |website=www.achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url=https://achievement.org/our-history/golden-plate-awards/}}{{cite news|date=2007 |title=Summit Overview Photo |website=Academy of Achievement|url=https://achievement.org/summit/|quote= Hal Prince receives the Golden Plate Award from Awards Council member and Nobel laureate Toni Morrison during the American Academy of Achievement's 2007 Banquet of the Golden Plate gala ceremonies in Washington, D.C.}}
• 2005: Honorary Doctorate of Letters from University of Oxford[http://www.ox.ac.uk/gazette/2004-5/weekly/100205/agen.htm "Oxford University Gazette, February 10, 2005: University Agenda"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110610020252/http://www.ox.ac.uk/gazette/2004-5/weekly/100205/agen.htm |date=June 10, 2011}}, University of Oxford, February 2005.
• 2005: Coretta Scott King Award for Remember: The Journey to School Integration{{Cite web |title=Coretta Scott King Book Awards – All Recipients, 1970–Present {{!}} Coretta Scott King Roundtable |url=https://www.ala.org/cskbart/coretta-scott-king-book-awards-all-recipients-1970-present#2005 |access-date=2024-10-25 |website=www.ala.org |language=en}}
• 2008: New Jersey Hall of Fame inductee{{cite web|url=https://njhalloffame.org/hall-of-famers/2008-inductees/toni-morrison/|title=Toni Morrison|date=April 11, 2014|website=New Jersey Hall of Fame|access-date=April 2, 2019}}
• 2009: Norman Mailer Prize, Lifetime Achievement{{cite web|url=https://nmcenter.org/mailer-prize/|title=Mailer Prize – The Norman Mailer Center|access-date=April 2, 2019|archive-date=August 10, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180810112931/https://nmcenter.org/mailer-prize/|url-status=dead}}
• 2010: Officier de la Légion d'Honneur{{cite news|title=Toni Morrison reçoit la Légion d'honneur |url=https://www.lexpress.fr/culture/livre/toni-morrison-recoit-la-legion-d-honneur_933627.html|newspaper=L'Express|access-date=August 6, 2019 |language=fr |date=November 3, 2010}}
• 2010: Institute for Arts and Humanities Medal for Distinguished Contributions to the Arts and Humanities from the Pennsylvania State University{{cite web|url=https://news.psu.edu/story/168447/2010/04/08/heard-campus-nobel-prize-winning-novelist-toni-morrison|title=Heard on Campus: Nobel Prize-winning novelist Toni Morrison|date=April 11, 2010|website=Penn State Today|access-date=August 7, 2019|archive-date=August 7, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190807105932/https://news.psu.edu/story/168447/2010/04/08/heard-campus-nobel-prize-winning-novelist-toni-morrison|url-status=dead}}
• 2011: Library of Congress Creative Achievement Award for Fiction{{cite web|url=https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-13-079/prize-for-american-fiction-awarded-to-don-delillo/2013-04-25/|title=Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction Awarded to Don DeLillo|website=Library of Congress|access-date=August 6, 2019}}
• 2011: Honorary Doctor of Letters at Rutgers University Graduation Commencement{{cite web|url=https://news.rutgers.edu/news-release/nobel-laureate-toni-morrison-speak-receive-honorary-degree-rutgers%E2%80%99-245th-commencement-may-15/20110208|title=Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison to Speak, Receive Honorary Degree at Rutgers' 245th Commencement May 15|date=February 8, 2011|website=Rutgers Today|access-date=August 6, 2019}}
• 2011: Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of Geneva[http://www.unige.ch/presse/archives/2011/dies-2011.html "Dies Academicus 2011"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111015190043/http://www.unige.ch/presse/archives/2011/dies-2011.html |date=October 15, 2011 }}, Service de communication, Université de Genève, October 2011.[http://www.unige.ch/communication/archives/2011/dies-2011/AllocutionDies2011-TM.pdf Toni Morrison's "Intervention"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304052023/http://www.unige.ch/communication/archives/2011/dies-2011/AllocutionDies2011-TM.pdf |date=March 4, 2016}}, Dies Academicus 2011, Université de Genève, October 14, 2011.
• 2012: Presidential Medal of Freedom{{cite web|last=Clark |first=Lesley |url=http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/white-house/article24730159.html |title=Obama awards medals to Bob Dylan, Toni Morrison, others |publisher=McClatchy Newspapers |date=May 29, 2012|access-date=September 28, 2017}}
• 2013: The Nichols-Chancellor's Medal awarded by Vanderbilt University{{cite web|last=Patterson |first=Jim|work=Vanderbilt News|date= May 9, 2013|title=Novelist Morrison tells grads to embrace interconnectedness|url=http://news.vanderbilt.edu/2013/05/toni-morrison-address}}
• 2013: Honorary Doctorate of Literature awarded by Princeton University{{cite web|last=Dienst |first=Karin|work=Princeton University news|date= June 4, 2013|title=Princeton awards six honorary degrees|url=https://www.princeton.edu/news/2013/06/04/princeton-awards-six-honorary-degrees}}
• 2013: PEN Oakland – Josephine Miles Literary Award for HomeFancher, Lou (December 24, 2013), [https://www.mercurynews.com/2013/12/24/2013-pen-oakland-winners-announced/ "2013 PEN Oakland winners announced"], The Mercury News.
• 2013: Writer in Residence at the American Academy in Rome[https://drexel.edu/now/archive/2013/May/Bob-Peck-Glorious-Enterprise-Award/ "Q&A with Robert McCracken Peck: For the Love of Art and History"], Drexel Now, Drexel University, May 7, 2013.
• 2014: Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award given by the National Book Critics Circle{{cite web|url=http://bookcritics.org/blog/archive/national-book-critics-circle-announces-its-finalists-for-publishing-year-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150122120832/http://bookcritics.org/blog/archive/national-book-critics-circle-announces-its-finalists-for-publishing-year-20|url-status=dead|archive-date=January 22, 2015|title=National Book Critics Circle Announces Finalists for Publishing Year 2014|date=January 19, 2015|publisher=National Book Critics Circle|access-date=January 29, 2015}}Dove, Rita, [https://www.bookcritics.org/2015/03/15/sandrof-award-rita-doves-homage-to-toni-morrison/ "Sandrof Award: Rita Dove's Homage to Toni Morrison"], National Book Critics Circle, March 15, 2015. Retrieved May 10, 2022.
• 2016: PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction{{cite web |url=http://www.chron.com/entertainment/arts-theater/article/PEN-Literary-Award-winners-announced-6862999.php |title=PEN Literary Award winners announced |work=Houston Chronicle |first=Maggie |last=Galehouse |date=March 1, 2016 |access-date=March 2, 2016}}{{cite web |url=http://www.pen.org/2016-pen-literary-award-winners |title=2016 PEN Literary Award Winners |publisher=PEN |date=March 1, 2016 |access-date=March 2, 2016}}
• 2016: The Charles Eliot Norton Professorship in Poetry (The Norton Lectures), Harvard University{{cite web

| url = http://mahindrahumanities.fas.harvard.edu/content/norton-lectures

| title = Norton Lectures

| website = Harvard.edu

| publisher = Harvard University

| access-date = November 9, 2016

| quote = Harvard's preeminent lecture series in the arts and humanities, the Norton Lectures recognize individuals of extraordinary talent who, in addition to their particular expertise, have the gift of wide dissemination and wise expression. The term 'poetry' is interpreted in the broadest sense to encompass all poetic expression in language, music, or the fine arts. Past Norton Professors have included T. S. Eliot, Jorge Luis Borges, Leonard Bernstein, Czesław Miłosz, John Cage, and Nadine Gordimer. The Norton Professor in 2016 is Toni Morrison.

| archive-date = November 2, 2016

| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20161102102334/http://mahindrahumanities.fas.harvard.edu/content/norton-lectures

| url-status = dead

}}

• 2016: The Edward MacDowell Medal, awarded by the MacDowell Colony{{cite news|url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/books/2016/04/08/toni-morrison-wins-macdowell-medal-for-lifetime-achievement/5px9373cxWj9LI78n0XTKO/story.html|title=Toni Morrison wins MacDowell medal for lifetime achievement |newspaper= The Boston Globe|agency=Associated Press|date=April 8, 2016|access-date=December 27, 2017}}
• 2018: The Thomas Jefferson Medal, awarded by The American Philosophical Society{{cite web|url=https://www.amphilsoc.org/2018-jefferson-medal|title=2018 Jefferson Medal |publisher=American Philosophical Society|access-date=April 6, 2019}}
• 2020: National Women's Hall of Fame inductee{{cite web| url = https://www.womenofthehall.org/inductee/toni-morrison/| title = Toni Morrison |publisher= National Women's Hall of Fame}}{{cite web| url = https://www.womenofthehall.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Church-Terrell-Mary-11.11.2020-Press-Release.pdf| title = National Women's Hall of Fame Virtual Induction Series Inaugural Event December 10, 2020| access-date = February 18, 2021| archive-date = October 16, 2022| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20221016123057/https://www.womenofthehall.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Church-Terrell-Mary-11.11.2020-Press-Release.pdf| url-status = dead}}{{cite web|date=November 11, 2020|title=National Women's Hall of Fame Virtual Induction Series Inaugural Event December 10, 2020|url=https://www.womenofthehall.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Lacks-Henrietta-11.11.2020-Press-Release.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/https://www.womenofthehall.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Lacks-Henrietta-11.11.2020-Press-Release.pdf |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live|access-date=November 12, 2020}}
• 2020: Designation of "Toni Morrison Day" in Ohio, to be celebrated annually on her birthday, February 18{{cite web| url = https://ohiohouse.gov/members/joseph-a-miller-iii/news/gov-signs-bill-to-honor-toni-morrisons-legacy-104889| title = Gov. Signs Bill To Honor Toni Morrison's Legacy|website=Ohio House of Representatives}}
• 2021: Featured on "Cleveland is the Reason" mural in downtown Cleveland (with other notable Cleveland area figures){{cite web|last=Polsal|first=Anthony|date=April 22, 2021|title=Myles Garrett expresses 'love of Cleveland' by unveiling downtown mural|url=https://www.clevelandbrowns.com/news/myles-garrett-expresses-love-of-cleveland-by-unveiling-downtown-mural|access-date=July 31, 2021|website=Cleveland Browns}}
• 2023: Featured on a USPS Forever stamp, designed by art director Ethel Kessler with photography by Deborah Feingold{{Cite web |date=October 24, 2022 |title=U.S. Postal Service Reveals Stamps for 2023 |work=United States Postal Service |url=https://about.usps.com/newsroom/national-releases/2022/1024-usps-reveals-stamps-for-2023.htm |access-date=October 26, 2022}}{{Cite web |title=Postal Service Celebrates Author Toni Morrison on New Forever Stamp |url=https://about.usps.com/newsroom/national-releases/2023/0307-usps-celebrates-author-toni-morrison-on-new-forever-stamp.htm|date=March 7, 2023 |access-date=2023-12-02 |website=about.usps.com |language=en}}

Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper? The Lion or the Mouse? Poppy or the Snake? was a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for Children nominee in 2008.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/06/arts/06grammylist.html|title=The Complete List of Grammy Nominees|date=December 6, 2007|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=August 6, 2019}}

• {{Cite book|title=The Bluest Eye|date=1970|isbn=0452287065|title-link=The Bluest Eye|last1=|first1=|publisher=Knopf }}
• {{Cite book|title=Sula|date=1973|isbn=140003343-8|title-link=Sula (novel)|last1=|first1=|publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing }}
• {{Cite book |title=Song of Solomon |date=1977 |isbn=140003342X |title-link=Song of Solomon (novel) |last1= |first1= |publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing}}
• {{Cite book|title=Tar Baby|date=1981|isbn=1400033446|title-link=Tar Baby (novel)|last1=|first1=|publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing }}
• {{Cite book|title=Beloved|date=1987|isbn=1400033411|title-link=Beloved (novel)|last1=|first1=|publisher=Knopf}}
• {{Cite book |title= Jazz |date= 1992 |isbn= 1400076218|title-link= Jazz (novel)|last1=|first1= |publisher= Knopf Doubleday Publishing }}
• {{Cite book |title= Paradise |date= 1998 |isbn= 0679433740|title-link= Paradise (Morrison novel) |last1= |first1= |publisher= Knopf }}
• {{Cite book |title= Love |date= 2003 |isbn= 0375409440|title-link= Love (Morrison novel) |last1= |first1=|publisher= Knopf }}
• {{Cite book |title= A Mercy |date= 2008 |isbn= 978-0307264237|title-link= A Mercy |last1=|first1= |publisher= Knopf }}
• {{Cite book |title=Home |date=2012 |isbn=978-0307594167 |title-link=Home (Morrison novel) |last1= |first1=|publisher=Knopf }}
• {{Cite book |title=God Help the Child |date=2015 |isbn=978-0307594174 |title-link=God Help the Child |last1= |first1=|publisher=Knopf }}

• The Big Box (1999). {{ISBN|978-0786823642}}.
• The Book of Mean People (2002). {{ISBN|978-0786805402}}.
• Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper?, The Lion or the Mouse?, Poppy or the Snake? (2007). {{ISBN|978-0743283915}}.
• Peeny Butter Fudge (2009). {{ISBN|978-1442459007}}.
• Little Cloud and Lady Wind (2010). {{ISBN|1416985239}}.
• Please, Louise (2014). {{ISBN|978-1416983385}}.
• A Toni Morrison Treasury: The Big Box; The Ant or the Grasshopper?; The Lion or the Mouse?; Poppy or the Snake?; Peeny Butter Fudge; The Tortoise or the Hare; Little Cloud and Lady Wind; Please, Louise (2023). {{ISBN|9781665915540}}.

• "Recitatif", in Amiri Baraka and Amina Baraka (eds), Confirmation: An Anthology of African American Women (1983).[https://masonlibraries.gmu.edu/dscff/s/aaaw/item/698 "Confirmation: An Anthology of African American Women"], Anthologies of African American Writing. Retrieved January 24, 2024.{{Cite web |last=Sustana |first=Catherine |date=January 7, 2019 |title=What Does Toni Morrison's 'Recitatif' Mean? |url=https://www.thoughtco.com/meaning-of-maggie-in-recitatif-2990506 |access-date=March 19, 2019 |website=ThoughtCo |language=en}} A hardback book version, with an introduction by Zadie Smith, was published in February 2022 (US: Knopf; UK: Chatto & Windus).{{cite magazine|url=https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/toni-morrison-recitatif-short-story-zadie-smith|title=The Genius of Toni Morrison's Only Short Story|first=Zadie|last=Smith|magazine=The New Yorker|date=January 23, 2022|access-date=February 24, 2022}}{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/28/books/review/toni-morrison-recitatif.html|title=Toni Morrison's Only Short Story Addresses Race by Avoiding Race|newspaper=The New York Times|first=Honorée Fanonne|last= Jeffers|author-link=Honorée Fanonne Jeffers|date=January 28, 2022}}{{cite magazine|url=https://www.thebookseller.com/previews/recitatif|title=Preview {{!}} Recitatif|magazine=The Bookseller|first=Alice|last=O'Keeffe|access-date=February 24, 2022}}

• N'Orleans: The Storyville Musical (aka New Orleans) (performed 1982) with Donald McKayle{{Cite news|last=Lawson|first=Carol|date=July 23, 1982|title=Broadway; Book and lyrics of new musical by Toni Morrison|newspaper=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1982/07/23/theater/broadway-book-and-lyrics-of-new-musical-by-toni-morrison.html|access-date=February 15, 2022}}
• Dreaming Emmett (performed 1986)
• Desdemona (first performed May 15, 2011, in Vienna){{cite web |url=http://www.festwochen.at/index.php?id=eventdetail&L=1&detail=629 |title=Wiener Festwochen: Desdemona |publisher=Festwochen.at|date=May 2011 |access-date=May 30, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120318014754/http://www.festwochen.at/index.php?id=eventdetail&L=1&detail=629 |archive-date=March 18, 2012}}{{cite web|title=Toni Morrison's Desdemona delivers a haunting, powerful 're-membering'|last=Thiessen|first=Erin Russell |date=May 26, 2011 |publisher=Expatica|url=https://kalamu.posthaven.com/review-theatretoni-morrisons-desdemona-delive|via=Neo-Griot}}{{cite web|url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/19/DDUE1LGVNH.DTL|title=Toni Morrison adds twist to 'Desdemona'|last=Winn|first=Steven |website=SFGate|date=October 20, 2011|access-date=October 21, 2011}}

• Five Poems (2002, limited edition book with illustrations by Kara Walker){{Cite journal|last=Li|first=Stephanie|date=Summer 2011|title=Five Poems: The Gospel According to Toni Morrison|url=http://muse.jhu.edu/content/crossref/journals/callaloo/v034/34.3.li.html|journal=Callaloo|language=en|volume=34|issue=3|pages=899–914|doi=10.1353/cal.2011.0173|s2cid=162544646|issn=1080-6512|url-access=subscription}}{{Cite magazine|date=August 6, 2019|title=Five Poems by Toni Morrison|url=https://believermag.com/five-poems-by-toni-morrison/|access-date=January 26, 2021|magazine=The Believer}}

• Margaret Garner (first performed May 2005)

• Foreword, The Black Photographers Annual Volume 1, edited by Joe Crawford (1973), {{OCLC|1783715}}
• Foreword and Preface, The Black Book edited by Harris, Levitt, Furman and Smith. Random House (1974), {{ISBN|978-1400068487}}
• Foreword, Race-ing Justice, En-gendering Power: Essays on Anita Hill, Clarence Thomas, and the Construction of Social Reality. Pantheon Books (1992), {{ISBN|978-0679741459}}
• Co-editor, Birth of a Nation'hood: Gaze, Script, and Spectacle in the O.J. Simpson Case (1997), {{ISBN|978-0307482266}}
• Remember: The Journey to School Integration (2004), {{ISBN|978-0618397402}}
• Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination (1992, 2007), {{ISBN|978-0307388636}}{{Cite book |last=Morrison |first=Toni |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2dVas48cQNgC |title=Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination |date=2007 |publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group |isbn=978-0307388636}}
• What Moves at the Margin: Selected Nonfiction, edited by Carolyn C. Denard (2008), {{ISBN|978-1604730173}}
• Editor (2009), Burn This Book: PEN Writers Speak Out on the Power of the Word, {{ISBN|978-0061878817}}
• The Origin of Others – The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures, Harvard University Press (2017), {{ISBN|978-0674976450}}
• Goodness and the Literary Imagination: Harvard Divinity School's 95th Ingersoll Lecture: With Essays on Morrison's Moral and Religious Vision. Edited by David Carrasco, Stephanie Paulsell, and Mara Willard. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press (2019)
• The Source of Self-Regard: Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations. New York: Alfred A. Knopf (2019), {{ISBN|978-0525521037}}. UK edition published as Mouth Full of Blood: Essays, Speeches, Meditations, London: Chatto & Windus (2019), {{ISBN|978-1784742850}}

• "Introduction." Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. [1885] The Oxford Mark Twain, edited by Shelley Fisher Fishkin. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. xxxii–xli.

{{Portal|United States|Biography|Literature}}

• American literature
• African-American literature
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{{Notelist}}

{{Reflist|30em}}

{{Commons category}}

{{Wikiquote}}

{{Library resources box|by=yes|viaf=109406177}}

• [https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/bookworm/toni-morrison-beloved "Toni Morrison: Beloved"]. From the Bookworm archives, August 15, 2019.
• [http://www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/bw Bookworm] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140607063918/http://www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/bw|date=June 7, 2014}} Interviews (Audio) with Michael Silverblatt
• {{Cite journal|url=https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1888/the-art-of-fiction-no-134-toni-morrison|title=Toni Morrison, The Art of Fiction No. 134|first1=Elissa|last1=Schappell|author-link=Elissa Schappell|author2=Claudia Brodsky Lacour|date=Fall 1993|journal=The Paris Review|volume=Fall 1993|issue=128|ref=none}}
• {{IMDb name}}
• {{C-SPAN}}
• {{Charlie Rose guest|1194}}
• {{Nobelprize}}
• [https://www.cornell.edu/video/toni-morrison-on-language-evil-and-the-white-gaze "Reading the Writing: A Conversation with Toni Morrison"] (Cornell University video, March 7, 2013)
• {{Guardian topic}}
• {{New York Times topic|new_id=person/toni-morrison}}
• [http://www.visionaryproject.com/morrisontoni Toni Morrison's oral history video excerpts] at The National Visionary Leadership Project
• [http://dla.library.upenn.edu/dla/pacscl/detail.html?id=PACSCL_PRIN_MUDD_C1491 Toni Morrison Papers] at [https://library.princeton.edu/special-collections/ Princeton University Library Special Collections]
• [https://www.tonimorrisonsociety.org/ Toni Morrison Society] based at Oberlin College
• {{OL author|id=OL31120A}}

{{Toni Morrison}}

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Category:Princeton University faculty

Category:Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winners

Category:The New Yorker people

Category:University at Albany, SUNY faculty

Category:Women Nobel laureates

Category:Women opera librettists

Category:Writers from Houston

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Category:Writers from Ohio

Category:Writers from Syracuse, New York