The Liberatory Power of Toni Morrison's Pen

By Sikivu Hutchinson

Excerpted from The North Star

The universe that we’ve inherited from Toni Morrison is:

The pell mell swoon of Jazz and its , mysterious crazy in  love triangle set against the backdrop of the Great Migration of African Americans to NYC, caught up in its  golden glow and cruel tease; the Blue-eyed devastation of Pecola, dreaming her truth, against incest, in the grinding poverty of segregationist Ohio; The twisted bond and  ride or die Sula-passion between two dramatically different black women; one fuck-you mad, one respectable and maybe veering towards madness; The elusive thrum of Paradise in an all-black town pulsing in the terror of the Middle Passage where black women’s fight for self-determination, bodily autonomy, and the Beloved blasted the white gaze to bits.

On my desk, I have a picture of Morrison with one of her most famous quotes: “If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” ...More @ The North Star