0:00:13 > 0:00:17"'She wasn't even two years old when she died', said her mother.
0:00:17 > 0:00:18"'Too little to understand.'
0:00:20 > 0:00:23"'Maybe she don't want to understand', said her sister.
0:00:27 > 0:00:32"Ohio had been calling itself a state only 70 years
0:00:32 > 0:00:36"when first one brother and then the next snatched up his shoes
0:00:36 > 0:00:40"and crept away from the lively spite the house felt for them."
0:00:45 > 0:00:48TONI: There's my house.
0:00:48 > 0:00:51That's where I was born, up there in the attic.
0:00:57 > 0:00:59My mother said it was very cold up there.
0:01:01 > 0:01:05- Mm, you had a terrace. - You call that a terrace?!
0:01:06 > 0:01:07That's a porch!
0:01:11 > 0:01:16- Only hookers were born in hospitals in those days.- Really?
0:01:16 > 0:01:19Married women had their babies at home.
0:01:25 > 0:01:29"'For a baby she throws a powerful spell', said Denver.
0:01:29 > 0:01:35"'No more powerful than the way I loved her', Sethe answered.
0:01:35 > 0:01:37"'Who would have thought a little old baby
0:01:37 > 0:01:39"'could harbour so much rage?'
0:01:41 > 0:01:45"'We could move', Sethe suggested once.
0:01:45 > 0:01:47"'What'd be the point?
0:01:47 > 0:01:50"'Not a house in the country ain't packed to its rafters with
0:01:50 > 0:01:52"'some dead Negro's grief.
0:01:53 > 0:01:55"'We lucky this ghost is a baby.'"
0:01:59 > 0:02:04This is me in the first grade with a dress my grandmother made.
0:02:04 > 0:02:10It was red, and I had this bow in my hair
0:02:10 > 0:02:15that is braided so tight,
0:02:15 > 0:02:18you can barely close your eyes.
0:02:21 > 0:02:26That little girl is now often called America's national writer,
0:02:26 > 0:02:29their first Lady of Literature.
0:02:30 > 0:02:34She is now an honoured citizen of her hometown.
0:02:34 > 0:02:36Who is Toni Morrison, Zoe?
0:02:36 > 0:02:39It says here that Toni was the first African-American
0:02:39 > 0:02:42and the eighth woman to win the Nobel Prize.
0:02:42 > 0:02:45I think that's cool because she must have inspired
0:02:45 > 0:02:47a lot of African-American people.
0:02:49 > 0:02:52What would you thank her for?
0:02:52 > 0:02:54I would thank her for writing these books
0:02:54 > 0:02:57because we know how people feel back then.
0:02:57 > 0:03:01She shows what African-Americans had to go through.
0:03:01 > 0:03:03Now I can have friends who are different races
0:03:03 > 0:03:06like Julian, cos he's my best friend.
0:03:06 > 0:03:10Discrimination is still going on today
0:03:10 > 0:03:13because some people hate the President that we have
0:03:13 > 0:03:14because of his race.
0:03:16 > 0:03:20Toni Morrison has reimagined her own past and, with it,
0:03:20 > 0:03:24that of black America, especially of black women.
0:03:24 > 0:03:30TONI: I always felt like a partial American, a fraudulent American.
0:03:34 > 0:03:38And finally not American at all, just I felt like a black person.
0:03:42 > 0:03:45When this Nobel Prize was given to me,
0:03:45 > 0:03:48I felt American, probably, for the first time.
0:03:48 > 0:03:50Toni Morrison...
0:03:50 > 0:03:52HE SPEAKS OWN LANGUAGE
0:03:59 > 0:04:02She may be establishment, but she's still 100% radical.
0:04:04 > 0:04:08Her books are taught in schools but they're banned in some.
0:04:09 > 0:04:12Her recurrent theme of childhood trauma
0:04:12 > 0:04:14is too much for some people to face.
0:04:16 > 0:04:18She's feisty, forthright,
0:04:18 > 0:04:22an uneasy heroine for a still troubled nation.
0:04:34 > 0:04:37Nowadays, Toni Morrison lives in an apartment
0:04:37 > 0:04:40high up in downtown Manhattan.
0:04:40 > 0:04:43But her quite astonishing first novel
0:04:43 > 0:04:45was set in her hometown.
0:04:45 > 0:04:46It's about a black girl
0:04:46 > 0:04:49'who longed to have blue eyes.'
0:04:49 > 0:04:53When The Bluest Eye first came out, the reaction to it
0:04:53 > 0:04:56was pretty negative by a lot of the black community, wasn't it?
0:04:56 > 0:04:59Well, the black community didn't like it
0:04:59 > 0:05:02because it was, you know, incest.
0:05:02 > 0:05:06I mean, my sister banned it - you talk about banned books,
0:05:06 > 0:05:09she said she wouldn't let her children read it
0:05:09 > 0:05:11until they were 18.
0:05:11 > 0:05:14And they didn't sell any copies of it,
0:05:14 > 0:05:19it was very low and, um...I got 3,000,
0:05:19 > 0:05:26which I spent taking my mother and my father and my children
0:05:26 > 0:05:27to Aruba.
0:05:28 > 0:05:32We had a hell of a time, it was fantastic.
0:05:32 > 0:05:34For people who'd never, you know...
0:05:34 > 0:05:37My mother came home, she was talking about,
0:05:37 > 0:05:39"Do you know what?
0:05:39 > 0:05:42"They wash out your tub
0:05:42 > 0:05:46"and do you know, they turn your bed down?"
0:05:46 > 0:05:48None of this had ever been done for her,
0:05:48 > 0:05:50she was in ecstasy.
0:05:52 > 0:05:55That was the benefit of The Bluest Eye for me.
0:05:57 > 0:05:59The main character, Pecola,
0:05:59 > 0:06:01is the victim not just of white society,
0:06:01 > 0:06:03but of her black father.
0:06:05 > 0:06:09"There were no marigolds in the fall of 1941.
0:06:09 > 0:06:11"We thought at the time
0:06:11 > 0:06:14"that it was because Pecola was having her father's baby
0:06:14 > 0:06:16"that the marigolds did not grow.
0:06:16 > 0:06:20"We could think of nothing but our own magic.
0:06:20 > 0:06:22"If we planted the seeds,
0:06:22 > 0:06:24"and said the right words over them,
0:06:24 > 0:06:27"they would blossom and everything would be all right.
0:06:29 > 0:06:33"We had dropped our seeds in our own little plot of black dirt
0:06:33 > 0:06:36"just as Pecola's father had dropped his seeds
0:06:36 > 0:06:39"in his own plot of black dirt.
0:06:39 > 0:06:42"The seeds shriveled and died. Her baby, too."
0:06:50 > 0:06:54The trigger for that creation of Pecola in The Bluest Eye
0:06:54 > 0:06:57was in fact a girl that you met at school?
0:06:57 > 0:06:58Yeah, it was.
0:06:58 > 0:07:04I think we were 10 or 11, she was a close friend,
0:07:04 > 0:07:06and, um...
0:07:06 > 0:07:11We were quarrelling about the existence of God
0:07:11 > 0:07:16and I was very certain that there was a God
0:07:16 > 0:07:19and she was very certain that there was not.
0:07:19 > 0:07:23And then she stopped the conversation and the argument
0:07:23 > 0:07:29by saying she had proof of His non-existence,
0:07:29 > 0:07:30and I said, "What is it?",
0:07:30 > 0:07:38and she said, "I have been praying for two years for blue eyes
0:07:38 > 0:07:40"and obviously He has not delivered."
0:07:43 > 0:07:47It was a real epiphany, because I looked at her
0:07:47 > 0:07:52and thought this would be awful if God had given her blue eyes.
0:07:54 > 0:08:00And I realised she was absolutely beautiful
0:08:00 > 0:08:03and at ten, you don't think in those terms -
0:08:03 > 0:08:07somebody's cute or, you know, whatever, but not beauty
0:08:07 > 0:08:09and that was the first time I saw it.
0:08:09 > 0:08:13She was very dark, she had these wonderful almond eyes,
0:08:13 > 0:08:18high cheek bones, lovely, you could go on.
0:08:18 > 0:08:22And she wanted something...other.
0:08:22 > 0:08:25Well, you know, we all had these little dolls,
0:08:25 > 0:08:30these little blonde dolls that the grown-ups gave us with affection.
0:08:30 > 0:08:33- And the Shirley Temple, and the Mary Janes...- Oh, God!
0:08:33 > 0:08:34..and all those things.
0:08:34 > 0:08:37- The Bojangles.- Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:08:42 > 0:08:44"I hated Shirley Temple.
0:08:44 > 0:08:46"Not because she was cute,
0:08:46 > 0:08:49"but because she danced with Bojangles,
0:08:49 > 0:08:52"who was my friend, my uncle, my daddy,
0:08:52 > 0:08:54"and who ought to have been soft-shoeing it
0:08:54 > 0:08:56"and chuckling with me.
0:08:59 > 0:09:03"Instead he was enjoying, sharing, giving a lovely dance thing
0:09:03 > 0:09:05"with one of those little white girls
0:09:05 > 0:09:08"whose socks never slid down under their heels.
0:09:13 > 0:09:16"I destroyed white baby dolls.
0:09:16 > 0:09:20"But the dismembering of dolls was not the true horror.
0:09:20 > 0:09:22"The truly horrifying thing
0:09:22 > 0:09:24"was the transference of the same impulses
0:09:24 > 0:09:26"to little white girls."
0:09:32 > 0:09:34Is that what drove you to write?
0:09:34 > 0:09:36Because you had to tell a story
0:09:36 > 0:09:39because you felt it hadn't been told?
0:09:39 > 0:09:43I thought somebody probably wrote that book but I didn't know
0:09:43 > 0:09:49what it was and every little black child in literature
0:09:49 > 0:09:52or in theatre was a joke...
0:09:54 > 0:09:56..or a pet,
0:09:56 > 0:10:00a Topsy, like in Uncle Tom's Cabin,
0:10:00 > 0:10:05and I was one of those little people
0:10:05 > 0:10:08and I wanted to read about such a child.
0:10:09 > 0:10:14It took five years for me to write that really small book,
0:10:14 > 0:10:19um, to pay attention,
0:10:19 > 0:10:22pay attention to this child.
0:10:23 > 0:10:25It may be...
0:10:25 > 0:10:29Maybe she's in difficulty, she's obviously hurt,
0:10:29 > 0:10:33she's abused and misused,
0:10:33 > 0:10:36but take her seriously, please.
0:10:41 > 0:10:43It was a world full of secrets.
0:10:45 > 0:10:50There used to be a house behind our house, a small little,
0:10:50 > 0:10:55almost like a shed and a woman lived in there and her name was Trope.
0:10:57 > 0:11:00We were not allowed to go there.
0:11:00 > 0:11:02My grandmother thought she was...
0:11:02 > 0:11:05She wasn't a street walker but she had...
0:11:05 > 0:11:08She invited people in.
0:11:08 > 0:11:11Nice-looking woman and I thought about her a lot
0:11:11 > 0:11:14because she was the hidden, you know -
0:11:14 > 0:11:16"Don't go over there because..."
0:11:19 > 0:11:21Other places were out of bounds too.
0:11:25 > 0:11:27"'We can't go all the way to the lake.'
0:11:27 > 0:11:29"'Yes, we can. Come on.'
0:11:31 > 0:11:34"We walked down tree-lined streets of soft grey houses
0:11:34 > 0:11:36"leaning like tired ladies.
0:11:40 > 0:11:43"The streets changed - houses looked more sturdy,
0:11:43 > 0:11:45"their paint was newer,
0:11:45 > 0:11:47"porch posts straighter, yards deeper.
0:11:52 > 0:11:55"The lakefront houses were the loveliest.
0:11:55 > 0:11:59"Garden furniture, ornaments, windows like shiny eyeglasses.
0:12:02 > 0:12:05"The backyards of these houses fell away in green slopes
0:12:05 > 0:12:09"down to a strip of sand and then the blue Lake Erie,
0:12:09 > 0:12:11"lapping all the way to Canada.
0:12:15 > 0:12:19"We reached a city park laid out with rosebuds, fountains,
0:12:19 > 0:12:21"picnic tables.
0:12:23 > 0:12:26"It was empty now, but sweetly expectant
0:12:26 > 0:12:29"of clean, white, well-behaved children and parents
0:12:29 > 0:12:33"who would play there above the lake in summer
0:12:33 > 0:12:36"before half-running, half-stumbling down the slope
0:12:36 > 0:12:37"to the welcoming water.
0:12:40 > 0:12:42"Black people were not allowed in the park,
0:12:42 > 0:12:44"and so it filled our dreams."
0:12:59 > 0:13:01Toni was looking back to her childhood
0:13:01 > 0:13:03in the '30s and '40s -
0:13:03 > 0:13:05the sense of exclusion,
0:13:05 > 0:13:06the longing to be white.
0:13:06 > 0:13:10But she was writing this in the 1960s.
0:13:10 > 0:13:12There was a black proposition around
0:13:12 > 0:13:15and Black is Beautiful in the '60s
0:13:15 > 0:13:18and a sort of sense of "Let's move on",
0:13:18 > 0:13:20but you weren't ready to move on, you wanted to go back.
0:13:20 > 0:13:22No, no, no, I thought there was this little...
0:13:22 > 0:13:25I understood Black is Beautiful
0:13:25 > 0:13:30but I was...that was a generation a little bit younger than me
0:13:30 > 0:13:32and I thought, "Wait a minute, why are you...?
0:13:32 > 0:13:35"Do you have to say that? Of course we are."
0:13:35 > 0:13:39And then...is that all? It's about beauty again?
0:13:39 > 0:13:43Is that what makes us human, acceptable?
0:13:43 > 0:13:47And besides, it's too frail.
0:13:47 > 0:13:53It was part of what I really despise which was addressing white people.
0:13:53 > 0:13:56"Who are you talking to, are you talking to me?"
0:13:56 > 0:13:59"No, I know I'm beautiful."
0:13:59 > 0:14:01Or it doesn't matter to me.
0:14:01 > 0:14:04You're talking to white people who are saying you're not
0:14:04 > 0:14:08and therefore you should be segregated or oppressed.
0:14:08 > 0:14:10I'm not talking to white people -
0:14:10 > 0:14:15I'm talking, in my books, I'm reading them,
0:14:15 > 0:14:16so I'm talking to me
0:14:16 > 0:14:19which means I'm talking to black people.
0:14:19 > 0:14:21Whereas actually, whatever Black is Beautiful was,
0:14:21 > 0:14:24it was a sort of...it belonged to the other, to the white gaze.
0:14:24 > 0:14:26That's right, it was the white man's gaze.
0:14:26 > 0:14:30- Which is your phrase... - Yes, that's what I wanted to avoid.
0:14:30 > 0:14:32Once...I always say this...
0:14:32 > 0:14:35Once I took white people out -
0:14:35 > 0:14:39I say white men, but I meant white people -
0:14:39 > 0:14:42it's like the whole world opened up.
0:14:42 > 0:14:45You could imagine anything, everything,
0:14:45 > 0:14:50instead of that little, what Jimmy Baldwin used to say,
0:14:50 > 0:14:51"Inside each of us,
0:14:51 > 0:14:55"a little white man lives on our shoulders."
0:14:55 > 0:14:57What's remarkable in your books
0:14:57 > 0:15:00is the empathy you show for men as well as women,
0:15:00 > 0:15:05even the rapist of this vulnerable child.
0:15:05 > 0:15:09He himself is vulnerable - there was that terrible scene.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11- Yeah, where he's... - Where he is caught...
0:15:11 > 0:15:13- His first sexual encounter. - Yeah.
0:15:13 > 0:15:17When he's innocent, he's innocent.
0:15:17 > 0:15:19"After some trouble with the buttons,
0:15:19 > 0:15:22"Cholly dropped his pants down to his knees.
0:15:22 > 0:15:26"But the excitement collecting inside him made him close his eyes
0:15:26 > 0:15:30"and regard her moans as no more than pine sighs over his head.
0:15:30 > 0:15:33"Just as he felt an explosion threatened,
0:15:33 > 0:15:35"Darlene froze and cried out.
0:15:35 > 0:15:38"He thought he'd hurt her, but when he looked at her face,
0:15:38 > 0:15:43"she was staring wildly at something over his shoulder.
0:15:43 > 0:15:46"He jerked around - there stood two white men,
0:15:46 > 0:15:49"one with a spirit lamp, the other with a flash light.
0:15:49 > 0:15:54"There was no mistake about their being white, he could smell it.
0:15:54 > 0:15:56"The men had long guns.
0:15:56 > 0:15:59"'Get on with it, nigger' said the flash light one.
0:15:59 > 0:16:02"'Sir?' said Cholly, trying to find a buttonhole.
0:16:02 > 0:16:06"I said, 'Get on with it and make it good, nigger, make it good.'
0:16:06 > 0:16:08"There was no place for Cholly's eyes to go."
0:16:10 > 0:16:14I mean, this is one character of many in here and he is,
0:16:14 > 0:16:17- in a way, the villain of the piece, you could say.- Mm-hm.
0:16:17 > 0:16:23And yet there were so many stages in his life and in his experience,
0:16:23 > 0:16:25and they don't necessarily come in sequence...
0:16:25 > 0:16:27That's the other thing about your books.
0:16:27 > 0:16:31We get some clues, a bit like a detective story,
0:16:31 > 0:16:32enough to intrigue us.
0:16:32 > 0:16:34It is like life, isn't it?
0:16:34 > 0:16:37Things happen, you're not quite sure what happened,
0:16:37 > 0:16:40and then suddenly, it all makes sense later.
0:16:40 > 0:16:41It blazes before you.
0:16:41 > 0:16:44I don't read my books
0:16:44 > 0:16:47except publicly, when somebody asks me.
0:16:52 > 0:16:55'Do you know, I read Beloved a couple of weeks ago.'
0:16:56 > 0:16:58'I was signing it for somebody.'
0:16:58 > 0:17:00- Thank you so much. - You're welcome.
0:17:00 > 0:17:05'And I just happened to turn to the first page'
0:17:05 > 0:17:06and I started reading.
0:17:07 > 0:17:12And I kept reading and I kept reading and I said to him
0:17:12 > 0:17:16something I normally don't say - I sometimes think -
0:17:16 > 0:17:19I said, "It's really good."
0:17:19 > 0:17:23Now, when you've been reading passages from The Bluest Eye,
0:17:23 > 0:17:25I'm thinking the same thing.
0:17:28 > 0:17:31- Did I do that wrong? - You cannot do anything wrong!
0:17:31 > 0:17:33I wish the world knew that.
0:17:33 > 0:17:35THEY LAUGH
0:17:35 > 0:17:37Thank you for everything.
0:17:39 > 0:17:41She is my reason for being a literary critic.
0:17:41 > 0:17:42That inspired me.
0:17:42 > 0:17:48It's Salamishah - S-A-L-A-M-I-S-H-A-H.
0:17:48 > 0:17:49TONI LAUGHS
0:17:49 > 0:17:52- That took all my strength. - I'm sure it did.
0:17:52 > 0:17:54- Oh! - My parents' imagination.
0:17:54 > 0:17:55Yeah.
0:17:55 > 0:17:58Thank you very much for being you.
0:17:59 > 0:18:04So many of my students tell me, "I just love The Bluest Eye."
0:18:04 > 0:18:06Thank you, Ms Morrison.
0:18:06 > 0:18:11And it is because it is a book that has saved a lot of girls.
0:18:11 > 0:18:12I thought about asking you
0:18:12 > 0:18:15to sign your name on my arm under your quote here.
0:18:15 > 0:18:16Oh, my goodness.
0:18:16 > 0:18:20The first time I saw her, it was so amazing to see
0:18:20 > 0:18:23and a little bit alarming how people glommed onto her.
0:18:24 > 0:18:29It was a largely black crowd and they were so proud of her
0:18:29 > 0:18:35and also wanting the connection that I yearned for myself
0:18:35 > 0:18:39because anyone with that kind of understanding of black life,
0:18:39 > 0:18:44let alone maleness and femaleness, you do want them to cosy up to you
0:18:44 > 0:18:47and tell you a few things about how to live yourself.
0:18:47 > 0:18:51- You were fantastic. Thank you so much.- My pleasure.
0:18:51 > 0:18:53Next, please.
0:18:53 > 0:18:57What I liked about her almost immediately was...
0:18:57 > 0:19:00how...welcoming she was.
0:19:00 > 0:19:03She made a sort of welcome table wherever she sat -
0:19:03 > 0:19:06and also her incredible sense of humour.
0:19:06 > 0:19:07LAUGHTER
0:19:07 > 0:19:10And people are always amazed that, you know, if you're that smart,
0:19:10 > 0:19:14then you can't be that funny too, but she gets to do both.
0:19:16 > 0:19:18APPLAUSE
0:19:20 > 0:19:23Would you get started with a reading from that novel
0:19:23 > 0:19:27before we start a conversation?
0:19:27 > 0:19:29LAUGHTER
0:19:29 > 0:19:31I just happen to have...
0:19:34 > 0:19:37Toni Morrison is making a now-rare public appearance
0:19:37 > 0:19:39to promote her new book.
0:19:39 > 0:19:44Now, if I pause in the reading,
0:19:44 > 0:19:48it's not because I don't know what's going on...
0:19:51 > 0:19:57..it's that I think I probably need and don't have my glasses.
0:19:57 > 0:19:59LAUGHTER
0:20:01 > 0:20:05At any rate, I'm just going to read a couple of pages in the voice
0:20:05 > 0:20:11and tell a story of a young girl who is called Rain
0:20:11 > 0:20:18because that is where the people who are taking care of her found her -
0:20:18 > 0:20:21sitting on the steps, shivering in the rain.
0:20:24 > 0:20:29"I don't want to kill them like I used to when I first got here
0:20:29 > 0:20:35"but then I wanted to kill everybody until they brought me a kitten.
0:20:35 > 0:20:39"She is a cat now and I tell her everything.
0:20:39 > 0:20:44"My black lady listens to me tell how it was.
0:20:44 > 0:20:47"Steve won't let me talk about it, neither will Evelyn.
0:20:47 > 0:20:51"They think I can read, but I can't.
0:20:51 > 0:20:56"Well, maybe a little. Signs and stuff.
0:20:56 > 0:21:01"Evelyn is trying to teach me. She calls it 'home schooling'.
0:21:01 > 0:21:05"I call it 'home drooling'
0:21:05 > 0:21:07"and 'home fooling'.
0:21:07 > 0:21:12"We are a fake family. OK, but fake.
0:21:12 > 0:21:14"Evelyn is a good substitute mother
0:21:14 > 0:21:18"but I'd rather have a sister like my black lady.
0:21:21 > 0:21:24"When we started walking back home,
0:21:24 > 0:21:29"after I told her everything about my life before Evelyn and Steve,
0:21:29 > 0:21:33"a truck with big boys in it passed us.
0:21:33 > 0:21:38"One of them hollered, 'Hey, Rain, who's your mammy?'
0:21:38 > 0:21:40"My black lady didn't turn around
0:21:40 > 0:21:44"but I stuck out my tongue and thumbed my nose at him.
0:21:44 > 0:21:47"One of them was Regis, a boy I know
0:21:47 > 0:21:51"because he comes to our house sometimes with his father
0:21:51 > 0:21:56"to give us firewood or baskets of corn.
0:21:56 > 0:21:58"The driver, an older boy,
0:21:58 > 0:22:02"turned the truck around so they could come after us.
0:22:02 > 0:22:07"Regis pointed a shotgun, just like Steve said.
0:22:07 > 0:22:12"My black lady saw him and threw her arm in front of my face.
0:22:12 > 0:22:17"The birdshot messed up her hand and arm.
0:22:17 > 0:22:20"We fell, both of us, her on top of me.
0:22:20 > 0:22:24"My heart was beating fast
0:22:24 > 0:22:27"because nobody had done that before.
0:22:27 > 0:22:34"I mean, Steve and Evelyn took me in and all,
0:22:34 > 0:22:40"but nobody put their own self in danger to save me."
0:22:40 > 0:22:42- You really inspired me. - Good.
0:22:42 > 0:22:45Toni has a fantastic memory, especially for childhood.
0:22:45 > 0:22:49She really remembers how a small thing
0:22:49 > 0:22:51can overwhelm a child.
0:22:51 > 0:22:53You know, the taste of something or...
0:22:53 > 0:22:56The ability that children have to do that,
0:22:56 > 0:22:58and most adults lose this ability.
0:23:00 > 0:23:04I know a lot about Toni's childhood that she's discussed with me and...
0:23:06 > 0:23:08I mean, certainly...
0:23:11 > 0:23:14What's amazing to me is that Toni is not...
0:23:14 > 0:23:17She is not an angry person.
0:23:18 > 0:23:21You know, there's a lot of anger in her books
0:23:21 > 0:23:23and it's an anger...
0:23:25 > 0:23:32..that obviously partakes of the totally appropriate anger
0:23:32 > 0:23:34of American blacks about what was done to them
0:23:34 > 0:23:38and what is still being done to them in a very different way.
0:23:38 > 0:23:43But that is always mixed with something personal,
0:23:43 > 0:23:47and I don't know Toni's history as a child,
0:23:47 > 0:23:50as a young girl, enough to know
0:23:50 > 0:23:54whether she is an angry person or was an angry person
0:23:54 > 0:23:59and that the anger that she expresses
0:23:59 > 0:24:00for this external reason,
0:24:00 > 0:24:02the history of blacks in America,
0:24:02 > 0:24:04isn't also connected to a personal anger,
0:24:04 > 0:24:06because you can't separate these things.
0:24:10 > 0:24:14You talk about your father, his anger with white men.
0:24:14 > 0:24:17How did that manifest itself when you were a child?
0:24:17 > 0:24:19Well, he wouldn't let them in the house.
0:24:19 > 0:24:22You know, the insurance guy would have to stand out
0:24:22 > 0:24:24if he was in the house.
0:24:24 > 0:24:28And he always said, "They will never be better,
0:24:28 > 0:24:31"nothing good will happen with white people ever",
0:24:31 > 0:24:33and it was personal.
0:24:33 > 0:24:35I think I was telling a story,
0:24:35 > 0:24:38watching him throw a white man down the steps
0:24:38 > 0:24:41and the person I was talking to said,
0:24:41 > 0:24:46"Well, didn't you feel horrified at the violence?"
0:24:46 > 0:24:48I said, "No."
0:24:48 > 0:24:52I thought, "Oh, my father is strong enough to protect me."
0:24:57 > 0:25:00You have to know that we were evicted from every place. You know...
0:25:00 > 0:25:02Where you really? Why was that, then?
0:25:02 > 0:25:04Because we were all poor.
0:25:04 > 0:25:07I mean, the rent was 4. Oh, we...
0:25:08 > 0:25:10Sometimes you can't make it.
0:25:10 > 0:25:14My father was working three jobs, my mother's not working,
0:25:14 > 0:25:16so I don't know how...
0:25:16 > 0:25:204 doesn't sound like much, but for them, it was.
0:25:20 > 0:25:22You know, he gets 45 cents here, 30 cents there.
0:25:22 > 0:25:24You've got to do stuff.
0:25:24 > 0:25:30But my mother, when they put the eviction notice up on the wall...
0:25:31 > 0:25:33..she just snatched it off.
0:25:33 > 0:25:35THEY LAUGH
0:25:35 > 0:25:37We were always moving from one...
0:25:37 > 0:25:40Everybody was moving because you couldn't stay anywhere -
0:25:40 > 0:25:42the money ran out.
0:25:42 > 0:25:47And then, wonderfully for improvement,
0:25:47 > 0:25:49there was World War II.
0:25:54 > 0:25:58People of my father's age - say 38, 40 - with a family
0:25:58 > 0:25:59were not drafted
0:25:59 > 0:26:03and...got jobs in shipyards.
0:26:03 > 0:26:08- He was a welder. - A welder. Paid decent money.
0:26:10 > 0:26:13And eventually, you know, we bought a house.
0:26:15 > 0:26:19You know, the man who threw that white man down the steps
0:26:19 > 0:26:22is the same man who told me...
0:26:22 > 0:26:26I was working for a white woman when I was around 12,
0:26:26 > 0:26:27cleaning up after school.
0:26:27 > 0:26:29Yes, you were a domestic.
0:26:29 > 0:26:32I was a domestic, very happy to be it.
0:26:32 > 0:26:38I got 2 every week and I gave one to my mother
0:26:38 > 0:26:40and one I could keep.
0:26:40 > 0:26:43But when I started at this woman's house,
0:26:43 > 0:26:44I told my father,
0:26:44 > 0:26:49"She's mean to me, Daddy, she complains all the time,"
0:26:49 > 0:26:50and he said...
0:26:51 > 0:26:56"Go to work, get your money and come on home.
0:26:56 > 0:26:58"You don't live there."
0:27:06 > 0:27:10One place she virtually did live was the local library,
0:27:10 > 0:27:12where she read and read and later got a job
0:27:12 > 0:27:15that she much preferred to cleaning.
0:27:16 > 0:27:21In those days, children's books, fairytales,
0:27:21 > 0:27:23were on the bottom shelf where you could read them...
0:27:26 > 0:27:31..and the next shelf was Faulkner or Tolstoy.
0:27:31 > 0:27:36There was no YA - young adult - there was no transition physically.
0:27:36 > 0:27:39They just put all the fairytales down there and then they got serious.
0:27:41 > 0:27:44My grandparents, they were southerners.
0:27:44 > 0:27:46They were sharecroppers.
0:27:48 > 0:27:51They were unschooled...
0:27:52 > 0:27:53..and they couldn't read.
0:27:54 > 0:27:59They were in a world where it was against the law to read.
0:28:00 > 0:28:03You could go to jail or be fined
0:28:03 > 0:28:08if you were white and taught a black person to read.
0:28:08 > 0:28:11That says it all about reading.
0:28:11 > 0:28:14So my family took the whole thing very serious.
0:28:14 > 0:28:16It was like a revolutionary act.
0:28:17 > 0:28:19So, as a child, she read all the classics.
0:28:19 > 0:28:22But stories also came from her mother
0:28:22 > 0:28:24who was brought up in the South.
0:28:25 > 0:28:28My mother was eight when she left.
0:28:28 > 0:28:32She talked about the South like it was paradise.
0:28:32 > 0:28:34- Did she? - Oh, yeah.
0:28:36 > 0:28:40She talked about ghosts that she'd seen in the woods,
0:28:40 > 0:28:43she talked about relatives
0:28:43 > 0:28:46and it was like this fairytale place for her.
0:28:48 > 0:28:51She was always smiling when she remembered it.
0:28:51 > 0:28:53But she never went back.
0:28:53 > 0:28:55My father, who said he hated it,
0:28:55 > 0:28:59went back every year to visit relatives and so on.
0:29:04 > 0:29:08- And then there were ghost stories that your...?- Oh, yes.
0:29:08 > 0:29:11Ghost stories, killings... I mean, you know...
0:29:11 > 0:29:14Think of Little Red Riding Hood - that's grotesque!
0:29:16 > 0:29:19Every story was a horror story.
0:29:25 > 0:29:26Then there was the radio.
0:29:27 > 0:29:31When you listened to a little 15-minute narrative on the radio,
0:29:31 > 0:29:34as it was in the '30s, you had to imagine it,
0:29:34 > 0:29:37because you could only hear it.
0:29:37 > 0:29:39- You had to picture it. - Yes, you had to picture it.
0:29:39 > 0:29:44# Hear, you sinners, hear my call
0:29:44 > 0:29:48# Satan's waitin' for you all
0:29:48 > 0:29:52# Better get your souls washed white
0:29:52 > 0:29:54# Better see the light
0:29:54 > 0:29:56# Amen! #
0:29:57 > 0:30:00The third thing, which is really important,
0:30:00 > 0:30:01is that my mother sang all the time...
0:30:03 > 0:30:06..and she had the best voice I have ever heard in my life.
0:30:06 > 0:30:11You know, maybe Jessye Norman, but that's a tight race. SHE LAUGHS
0:30:11 > 0:30:16I have said to her very often that she wasn't so much writing
0:30:16 > 0:30:18as she was channelling.
0:30:18 > 0:30:20The ancestors were speaking through her
0:30:20 > 0:30:22and I think they continue to do so.
0:30:22 > 0:30:24And she doesn't deny it.
0:30:24 > 0:30:26She accepts my silliness
0:30:26 > 0:30:28when I'm talking to her about her writing.
0:30:28 > 0:30:32But I really do feel that there is so much to be said,
0:30:32 > 0:30:35so many experiences,
0:30:35 > 0:30:37the collective and the individual experiences.
0:30:45 > 0:30:48She doesn't spare the rod, she tells the truth
0:30:48 > 0:30:50and she tells it in a way
0:30:50 > 0:30:55that makes it possible for people who are resistant to this history
0:30:55 > 0:30:56to simply...
0:30:56 > 0:31:01They are forced to embrace it, forced to acknowledge it
0:31:01 > 0:31:05and forced to recognise the power of her words.
0:31:05 > 0:31:06My goodness.
0:31:08 > 0:31:11It is after the Civil War and black Southerners
0:31:11 > 0:31:14are establishing their own settlements in the West.
0:31:16 > 0:31:19"Here, freedom was not entertainment,
0:31:19 > 0:31:23"like a carnival or a hoedown that you can count on once a year.
0:31:24 > 0:31:27"Here, freedom was a test administered by the natural world
0:31:27 > 0:31:31"that a man had to take for himself every day.
0:31:31 > 0:31:34"If he passed enough tests long enough, he was king.
0:31:36 > 0:31:40"They were proud that none of their women had ever worked
0:31:40 > 0:31:43"in a white man's kitchen or nursed a white child.
0:31:43 > 0:31:46"Although field labour was harder and carried no status,
0:31:46 > 0:31:49"they believed the rape of women who worked in white kitchens was,
0:31:49 > 0:31:53"if not a certainty, a distinct possibility,
0:31:53 > 0:31:57"neither of which they could bear to contemplate.
0:31:57 > 0:32:01"So, they exchanged that danger for the relative safety of brutal work."
0:32:04 > 0:32:08Toni does most of her writing now not in her New York apartment
0:32:08 > 0:32:11but in her boathouse up the Hudson River.
0:32:13 > 0:32:17A fire here 20 years ago destroyed most of her possessions.
0:32:17 > 0:32:19But she did save some family photos
0:32:19 > 0:32:25'and her high school yearbook from when she graduated in 1949.'
0:32:28 > 0:32:31- We're nearly there. The Vs. - Those are the Vs?- Yeah.
0:32:31 > 0:32:34'She was called Chloe Wofford then.'
0:32:34 > 0:32:38- Zowada, Whitaker, Wilcox... - SHE LAUGHS
0:32:40 > 0:32:42Where am I?
0:32:43 > 0:32:45- Ah!- There she is!
0:32:45 > 0:32:47This is Chloe Wofford.
0:32:47 > 0:32:52She's been dolled up for it, as well, for the occasion.
0:32:52 > 0:32:55- I wore earrings, no lipstick. - Yeah.
0:32:55 > 0:32:56Wow.
0:32:56 > 0:32:59Now, here you are in this picture.
0:32:59 > 0:33:00"They led the 1949ers."
0:33:00 > 0:33:03Does that mean that you distinguished yourself?
0:33:03 > 0:33:06Yes, well, I was the treasurer.
0:33:06 > 0:33:08Great skirt. I remember it.
0:33:08 > 0:33:11- Dark maroon...- And white socks. - ..and cream...
0:33:11 > 0:33:15Oh, yes, thick white socks, we all wore those.
0:33:18 > 0:33:22- Physical education. - Oh, dear.
0:33:22 > 0:33:25"Senior and junior girls who are interested in books
0:33:25 > 0:33:28"are given an opportunity to work in the school library
0:33:28 > 0:33:30"under the direction of Miss Pitts."
0:33:30 > 0:33:32Oh, yes, I remember her.
0:33:32 > 0:33:34What was she like?
0:33:34 > 0:33:36She was rather sweet.
0:33:36 > 0:33:39- Miss Pitts was the typing teacher. - A-ha!
0:33:39 > 0:33:46You know, in those days, women who were teachers were highly respected.
0:33:46 > 0:33:49It was one of the few professional jobs.
0:33:49 > 0:33:55So they were very proud of themselves and we looked up to them.
0:33:55 > 0:33:58Home economics. That's called cooking in English.
0:33:58 > 0:34:00THEY CHUCKLE
0:34:04 > 0:34:05Dear Lord...
0:34:17 > 0:34:20'From school, she went on to Howard in Washington,
0:34:20 > 0:34:22'the most prestigious of the black universities.'
0:34:24 > 0:34:26Oh, wow! That is a picture!
0:34:26 > 0:34:27SHE LAUGHS
0:34:27 > 0:34:31"Howard University coming home queen...
0:34:31 > 0:34:33- "Runner-up, Toni Morrison." - I didn't win.
0:34:33 > 0:34:35You should have won. Look at that!
0:34:35 > 0:34:37He's a good-looking guy.
0:34:37 > 0:34:40- Yeah, there were all lovely. - Yeah.
0:34:40 > 0:34:42"Without any drowsiness or warning,
0:34:42 > 0:34:44"she fell asleep.
0:34:44 > 0:34:49"There out of that dark void sprang a vivid, fully felt dream.
0:34:49 > 0:34:52"Booker's hand was moving between her thighs
0:34:52 > 0:34:55"and when her arms flew up and closed over his back,
0:34:55 > 0:34:59"he extracted his fingers and slid between her legs
0:34:59 > 0:35:01"what they call the pride and wealth of nations.
0:35:01 > 0:35:04"She wrapped her legs around his rocking hips
0:35:04 > 0:35:08"as though too slow them or help them or keep them there.
0:35:08 > 0:35:10"Bride woke up moist and humming."
0:35:10 > 0:35:14I did say to Toni very early on, "I really like your sex scenes."
0:35:14 > 0:35:16I know!
0:35:16 > 0:35:18It's like, more, more!
0:35:18 > 0:35:20But they're all so different, aren't they?
0:35:20 > 0:35:22- They are. - The book is full of them.
0:35:22 > 0:35:25There's one in Sula where Sula gets into bed with her lover
0:35:25 > 0:35:29and wants desperately for him to make love to her and he won't.
0:35:29 > 0:35:32And I remember as a teenager, I thought, "This is horrible!"
0:35:32 > 0:35:36"This is my idea of a nightmare."
0:35:36 > 0:35:38And this one is completely different.
0:35:38 > 0:35:40They're all different, but luscious.
0:35:42 > 0:35:44God Help The Child gives a modern twist
0:35:44 > 0:35:46to the themes of her first novel -
0:35:46 > 0:35:49the favouring of light-skinned over dark,
0:35:49 > 0:35:51not just white over black,
0:35:51 > 0:35:54but a hierarchy among black people, too.
0:35:55 > 0:35:58This reared its head at college, in the South.
0:36:04 > 0:36:07I learned about what we call skin privileges
0:36:07 > 0:36:10when I went away to college -
0:36:10 > 0:36:13powerful racial discrimination.
0:36:13 > 0:36:17If I saw a white man walking down the street and I was by myself,
0:36:17 > 0:36:19I'd cross the street.
0:36:19 > 0:36:24If I saw a black man, I would run toward him for safety.
0:36:26 > 0:36:29And on campus, where I was feeling safe and happy,
0:36:29 > 0:36:32there was this other kind of discrimination
0:36:32 > 0:36:36where people were ranked on the colour of their skin socially.
0:36:39 > 0:36:43In the new novel, the main character is rejected by her mother
0:36:43 > 0:36:45because she is too dark,
0:36:45 > 0:36:49but as an adult makes a virtue of her ebony blackness.
0:36:50 > 0:36:53"I became a deep, dark beauty
0:36:53 > 0:36:56"who doesn't need Botox for kissable lips
0:36:56 > 0:36:59"or tanning spas to hide a deathlike pallor.
0:36:59 > 0:37:04"I sold my elegant blackness to all those childhood ghosts.
0:37:04 > 0:37:08"I have to say, forcing those tormentors -
0:37:08 > 0:37:11"the real ones and others like them -
0:37:11 > 0:37:13"to drool with envy when they see me,
0:37:13 > 0:37:15"is more than payback.
0:37:15 > 0:37:16"It's glory."
0:37:18 > 0:37:22Toni Morrison studied and later taught at Howard.
0:37:22 > 0:37:25Her friend Jessie Norman was there soon after.
0:37:25 > 0:37:29Unlike Toni, Jessie was brought up in the South.
0:37:29 > 0:37:32It must have been a defining experience for her as a writer.
0:37:32 > 0:37:33I'm certain that it had to be.
0:37:33 > 0:37:36Imagine the students that were there
0:37:36 > 0:37:41and their stories from Arkansas and Alabama and Georgia and Mississippi
0:37:41 > 0:37:44and all of these incredible experiences,
0:37:44 > 0:37:48and so that had to have been a widening of her own thought
0:37:48 > 0:37:49about what had happened
0:37:49 > 0:37:51and what was still happening
0:37:51 > 0:37:54and what unfortunately is still happening.
0:37:58 > 0:38:00I recognise everything that she writes
0:38:00 > 0:38:05because it actually happened and it wasn't that long ago
0:38:05 > 0:38:10that we had people gathering at a lynching,
0:38:10 > 0:38:14a person with a rope or something around the neck
0:38:14 > 0:38:17and hung from a tree.
0:38:17 > 0:38:19That people gathered to look at this
0:38:19 > 0:38:22as though it were some sort of entertainment.
0:38:22 > 0:38:24It wasn't that long ago.
0:38:24 > 0:38:26MUSIC: Strange Fruit by Billie Holiday
0:38:26 > 0:38:32# Southern trees bear a strange fruit... #
0:38:32 > 0:38:35Lynchings carried on well into the 20th century.
0:38:37 > 0:38:39# And blood at the root... #
0:38:39 > 0:38:41This was in 1911.
0:38:41 > 0:38:44# Black bodies swingin'
0:38:44 > 0:38:48# In the Southern breeze. #
0:38:48 > 0:38:50It was fashionable to take photographs of lynchings
0:38:50 > 0:38:53and circulate them as postcards.
0:38:53 > 0:38:56# From the poplar trees. #
0:39:11 > 0:39:15Toni Morrison put pictures like that into a book she edited -
0:39:15 > 0:39:18The Black Book, a sort of scrapbook,
0:39:18 > 0:39:21which gave black people a history.
0:39:23 > 0:39:27The book for which she later became famous, Beloved,
0:39:27 > 0:39:29was inspired by this cutting.
0:39:31 > 0:39:33"When the slave hunters came to the house
0:39:33 > 0:39:34"in which they were concealed,
0:39:34 > 0:39:39"she caught a shovel and struck two of her children on the head,
0:39:39 > 0:39:41"and cut the throat of the third."
0:39:57 > 0:40:00The Black Book was the fruit of the Civil Rights Movement
0:40:00 > 0:40:02and Black Power.
0:40:05 > 0:40:08She was now Toni, not Chloe,
0:40:08 > 0:40:11and Morrison after a man she'd married and divorced.
0:40:11 > 0:40:13She was working in publishing.
0:40:16 > 0:40:19It was her form of activism.
0:40:19 > 0:40:22I thought, "I'm not out in the streets marching,
0:40:22 > 0:40:27"I'm not giving speeches", etc - it was a very active time.
0:40:29 > 0:40:33So I thought, "Well, I want the voices documented,
0:40:33 > 0:40:37"I don't want them distorted by this columnist or this political...
0:40:37 > 0:40:40"I want them to say what they say."
0:40:40 > 0:40:44And so I deliberately chose Toni Cade Bambara,
0:40:44 > 0:40:48Gail Jones, the writers, the poets,
0:40:48 > 0:40:51Dumas, who's an incredible writer,
0:40:51 > 0:40:55and along with the political figures, their story.
0:40:55 > 0:40:58It was deliberate, it was calculated
0:40:58 > 0:41:04and I thought, "I can't leave that up to 'them'."
0:41:06 > 0:41:09She published Muhammad Ali,
0:41:09 > 0:41:13the boxer who was persona non grata in some circles
0:41:13 > 0:41:15since he'd changed his name
0:41:15 > 0:41:18and started championing black political causes.
0:41:20 > 0:41:23Muhammad Ali, he was marvellous.
0:41:23 > 0:41:27He didn't pay much attention to me as an editor in the beginning.
0:41:27 > 0:41:28If I asked him a question,
0:41:28 > 0:41:31he would answer a man or turn to a man,
0:41:31 > 0:41:33and I thought, "Oh, God."
0:41:34 > 0:41:38And the men, the sales force, the other guys, they were in awe -
0:41:38 > 0:41:42"Look at his hands! Oh, my, did you see his...?"
0:41:42 > 0:41:46They weren't gonna tell him anything and they did anything he wanted to.
0:41:46 > 0:41:48And I thought, "This is not gonna work."
0:41:48 > 0:41:52And then I remembered that I had read an article in the New York Times
0:41:52 > 0:41:56where an older woman was being evicted.
0:41:56 > 0:41:59He did something to prevent it,
0:41:59 > 0:42:01and I thought, "He respects older women."
0:42:03 > 0:42:07So I went into my mommy role
0:42:07 > 0:42:10and while everybody else was oohing and aahing
0:42:10 > 0:42:14I'd say, "Ali, get up for a minute," and he would stand up.
0:42:14 > 0:42:17I'd say, "Go over there, sit down, the reporters are coming."
0:42:17 > 0:42:22He did everything I said so long as I was not a girl.
0:42:22 > 0:42:27It's extremely difficult to win the revolutionary struggle.
0:42:27 > 0:42:30No...more...prisons.
0:42:30 > 0:42:33In the lengthening list of embattled black militants,
0:42:33 > 0:42:37the name and already the legend of Angela Davis are unique.
0:42:39 > 0:42:45Another fighter that Toni edited was the FBI's most wanted, Angela Davis.
0:42:45 > 0:42:49A young academic, a communist, a Black Panther,
0:42:49 > 0:42:54she bought the gun that was used by black prisoners in an escape bid.
0:42:54 > 0:42:59A highly controversial figure, she became a heroine of the left.
0:43:01 > 0:43:03Toni Morrison contacted me
0:43:03 > 0:43:07shortly after I was released from jail.
0:43:09 > 0:43:15She raised the prospect of my writing an autobiography.
0:43:15 > 0:43:21My first response was, at...how old was I then?
0:43:21 > 0:43:23I think I was 27.
0:43:23 > 0:43:27How could I possibly write an autobiography?
0:43:27 > 0:43:29I was far too young.
0:43:29 > 0:43:33So that was the beginning of our friendship.
0:43:33 > 0:43:36Angela came to the office and we talked
0:43:36 > 0:43:40to see whether she liked or trusted me and she did.
0:43:40 > 0:43:45And so she wrote the book, I edited it, shaped it a little bit.
0:43:45 > 0:43:50She helped me to think about a very different type of writing,
0:43:50 > 0:43:55by asking me, "Well, what was in the room?
0:43:55 > 0:43:59"What did it look like, what did it sound like?"
0:43:59 > 0:44:06And eventually, the autobiography emerged from those conversations.
0:44:09 > 0:44:13Morrison was a mentor to others, but all the while, she was writing,
0:44:13 > 0:44:16she was leading a double life.
0:44:16 > 0:44:20I was in the secretarial pool at Random House.
0:44:20 > 0:44:22She said, "Would you please type something for me?
0:44:22 > 0:44:24So I said, "Sure, fine."
0:44:24 > 0:44:28We realised later that we were typing parts of The Bluest Eye.
0:44:35 > 0:44:38I would often ride with her
0:44:38 > 0:44:43from her house to the office in Manhattan.
0:44:43 > 0:44:46She always had a small pad nearby and a pen,
0:44:46 > 0:44:50and when the traffic stopped, she would write something.
0:44:51 > 0:44:56She was also single mother with two small sons.
0:44:56 > 0:45:00And at her house, cooking for her sons,
0:45:00 > 0:45:03she might take 30 seconds out of that task
0:45:03 > 0:45:06and she would scribble something down.
0:45:06 > 0:45:10She was really so immersed in the lives of her characters
0:45:10 > 0:45:14that she was living simultaneously in two worlds.
0:45:14 > 0:45:17How did you manage all that?
0:45:17 > 0:45:23I am only aware now of the errors I made,
0:45:23 > 0:45:25um...the difficulties,
0:45:25 > 0:45:32because during the time of rearing them and working and running about,
0:45:32 > 0:45:35it was just the next thing to do.
0:45:35 > 0:45:43I remember sitting in my office with a yellow legal pad
0:45:43 > 0:45:47and I was so overwhelmed that I wrote a list of everything I had to do,
0:45:47 > 0:45:50everything, you know.
0:45:50 > 0:45:53Something my mother, something New York Times -
0:45:53 > 0:45:55you know, everything.
0:45:55 > 0:45:59And then I decided to write what I wanted to do
0:45:59 > 0:46:02and there were two things -
0:46:02 > 0:46:07the first was mother my children, the second was write books.
0:46:09 > 0:46:11"'You think I don't know what your life is like
0:46:11 > 0:46:13"'just because I ain't livin' it?
0:46:13 > 0:46:16"'I know what every colored woman in this country is doing.'
0:46:16 > 0:46:17"'What's that?'
0:46:17 > 0:46:20"'Dying. Just like me.
0:46:20 > 0:46:22"'But the difference is they dyin' like a stump.
0:46:22 > 0:46:26"'Me, I'm going down like one of those redwoods.
0:46:26 > 0:46:28"'I sure did live in this world.'
0:46:28 > 0:46:31"'Really? What have you got to show for it?'
0:46:31 > 0:46:32"'Show? To who?
0:46:32 > 0:46:36"'Girl, I got my mind and what goes on in it,
0:46:36 > 0:46:38"'which is to say I got me.'"
0:46:40 > 0:46:43Lorain, Ohio, my hometown.
0:46:43 > 0:46:47After the success of her third book, Song of Solomon,
0:46:47 > 0:46:50she gave up her job in publishing to write,
0:46:50 > 0:46:53though she kept one foot on the ground by teaching too.
0:46:55 > 0:46:58She wasn't just championing women and their lives,
0:46:58 > 0:47:00she wanted men to be free as well.
0:47:03 > 0:47:06Song of Solomon was very representative
0:47:06 > 0:47:08of the world my father came from,
0:47:08 > 0:47:10the black bourgeoisie,
0:47:10 > 0:47:13but it was also an evocation of something
0:47:13 > 0:47:18I was afraid of for myself, which was to claim space.
0:47:18 > 0:47:26How did you claim space and not suffer as a black man?
0:47:26 > 0:47:30The entire book turned my world around
0:47:30 > 0:47:34by showing me that I had been living there the whole time,
0:47:34 > 0:47:37I just had never had any language for it.
0:47:41 > 0:47:43The main character in Song of Solomon
0:47:43 > 0:47:45is known as Milkman,
0:47:45 > 0:47:48because he was breast-fed for so long.
0:47:48 > 0:47:50His father was called Macon Dead.
0:47:50 > 0:47:53Slaves had no names of their own -
0:47:53 > 0:47:58they were called after their owners or had made up names.
0:47:58 > 0:48:00I'm always intrigued to know
0:48:00 > 0:48:02what people are going to be called in your books,
0:48:02 > 0:48:04whether it's you doing it or it's really,
0:48:04 > 0:48:06you know...where it comes from.
0:48:06 > 0:48:08They tell me what their names are.
0:48:08 > 0:48:12- They tell you what their names are? - Yeah.- Do they speak to you, your characters?
0:48:12 > 0:48:13Oh, yes. You know, I can...
0:48:13 > 0:48:18If I used the wrong name, nothing happens with the character.
0:48:18 > 0:48:21If I get the right name, if I hear it right,
0:48:21 > 0:48:23then they come alive.
0:48:24 > 0:48:28They sometimes kind of threaten you a little bit.
0:48:28 > 0:48:32In Song of Solomon, Pilate, I had to shut her up.
0:48:32 > 0:48:35Macon Dead, where did that come from?
0:48:37 > 0:48:40Oh, well, some historical stuff I read about.
0:48:40 > 0:48:46Freed slaves taking names and getting names and choosing names,
0:48:46 > 0:48:51and the indifference of the northerners
0:48:51 > 0:48:52who were writing this down.
0:48:54 > 0:48:57"'Papa couldn't read, couldn't even sign his name,
0:48:57 > 0:48:58"'had a mark he used.
0:48:58 > 0:49:00"'They tricked him.
0:49:00 > 0:49:03"'He signed something, I don't know what,
0:49:03 > 0:49:06"'and they told him they owned his property.
0:49:08 > 0:49:10"'He never read nothing.
0:49:10 > 0:49:13"'Everything bad that ever happened to him
0:49:13 > 0:49:16"'happened because he couldn't read.
0:49:16 > 0:49:18"Got his name messed up cos he couldn't read.
0:49:19 > 0:49:21"'His name? How?'
0:49:22 > 0:49:25"'When freedom came, all the colored people in the state
0:49:25 > 0:49:28"'had to register with the Freedman's Bureau.'
0:49:29 > 0:49:32"'Your father was a slave?'
0:49:32 > 0:49:34"'What kind of foolish question is that?
0:49:34 > 0:49:36"'Of course he was.
0:49:36 > 0:49:40"'Papa was in his teens and went to sign up
0:49:40 > 0:49:43"'but the man behind the desk was drunk.
0:49:43 > 0:49:45"'He asked Papa where he was born.
0:49:45 > 0:49:46"'Papa said, 'Macon.'
0:49:48 > 0:49:52"'Then he asked him who his father was. Papa said, 'He's dead.'
0:49:55 > 0:49:59"'Well, the Yankee wrote it all down but in the wrong spaces
0:49:59 > 0:50:00"'and in the space of his name,
0:50:00 > 0:50:04"'the fool wrote, 'Dead' comma 'Macon.'
0:50:04 > 0:50:07"'But Papa couldn't read so he never found out
0:50:07 > 0:50:10"'what he was registered as till Mama told him.'"
0:50:13 > 0:50:16Even if it's hundreds of years ago, it doesn't go away.
0:50:16 > 0:50:19Oh, yeah, it doesn't go away. It doesn't go away.
0:50:19 > 0:50:23The past colours the present, and the present contorts the past,
0:50:23 > 0:50:24so that's life.
0:50:24 > 0:50:26You have to live like that.
0:50:29 > 0:50:31Slavery haunts her books.
0:50:33 > 0:50:35Beloved is the story of Sethe,
0:50:35 > 0:50:39a slave woman who escapes the south across the Ohio River.
0:50:43 > 0:50:45The Ohio was their River Jordan,
0:50:45 > 0:50:48their passage to the promised land.
0:50:51 > 0:50:55But even north of the river, Sethe and her baby were not safe.
0:50:57 > 0:51:00She could be seized by slave catchers
0:51:00 > 0:51:01and taken back south.
0:51:03 > 0:51:08"Inside, two boys bled in the sawdust and dirt
0:51:08 > 0:51:09"at the feet of a nigger woman
0:51:09 > 0:51:13"holding a blood-soaked child to her chest with one hand,
0:51:13 > 0:51:16"and an infant by the heels on the other.
0:51:17 > 0:51:19"She did not look at them.
0:51:19 > 0:51:22"She simply swung the baby toward the wall planks,
0:51:22 > 0:51:24"missed, and tried to connect a second time
0:51:24 > 0:51:26"when out of nowhere
0:51:26 > 0:51:30"the old nigger boy, still mewing, ran through the door behind them
0:51:30 > 0:51:34"and snatched the baby from the arc of its mother's swing."
0:51:39 > 0:51:42It's the dead baby, Beloved,
0:51:42 > 0:51:45who returns to haunt Sethe's house.
0:51:47 > 0:51:51This slave pen was just south of the Ohio River,
0:51:51 > 0:51:53on a farm in Kentucky,
0:51:53 > 0:51:55a farm like Sweet Home,
0:51:55 > 0:51:59where Sethe was raped and savagely beaten.
0:51:59 > 0:52:02My great-grandfather, I got to see every day,
0:52:02 > 0:52:05and he was born before slavery ended
0:52:05 > 0:52:08and his family was brought across
0:52:08 > 0:52:10from Virginia into Kentucky.
0:52:12 > 0:52:15This building, it's a human warehouse,
0:52:15 > 0:52:20a place where people of African descent were kept and stored
0:52:20 > 0:52:23and then later marched from Kentucky
0:52:23 > 0:52:27760 miles to Natchez, Mississippi to be sold.
0:52:29 > 0:52:31Sold by skin colour, by skill.
0:52:31 > 0:52:35One of the myths is we were only good for farm labour.
0:52:36 > 0:52:40My great-grandfather was the Westmorelands' blacksmith.
0:52:42 > 0:52:44As my dad told me when I was eight,
0:52:44 > 0:52:47anything that was made of metal on that plantation,
0:52:47 > 0:52:49my great-grandfather made it.
0:52:49 > 0:52:54So their value was twice that of the ordinary slave,
0:52:54 > 0:52:55sometimes three times.
0:52:59 > 0:53:05In America, one of the most painful parts of being despised
0:53:05 > 0:53:09is being told you're nobody and that you have no history,
0:53:09 > 0:53:11you have no value
0:53:11 > 0:53:14and that you're just a burden, a waste.
0:53:17 > 0:53:20People think that we came here to take something,
0:53:20 > 0:53:22to be given something.
0:53:24 > 0:53:29This building teaches that we came and we had value,
0:53:29 > 0:53:31we built, we contributed...
0:53:32 > 0:53:36..and that when people needed money,
0:53:38 > 0:53:40..we were sold, just like a tractor...
0:53:42 > 0:53:44..or something of real value
0:53:44 > 0:53:48and that, in the process, these people with dark skin,
0:53:48 > 0:53:49people with beige skin,
0:53:49 > 0:53:53people with almost white skin, helped to build America.
0:54:07 > 0:54:10Toni Morrison said she saw no memorials to slavery,
0:54:10 > 0:54:13so that was what Beloved was for.
0:54:16 > 0:54:19Her words inspired people to make a memorial.
0:54:21 > 0:54:25"There is no place you or I can go to think about or not think about,
0:54:25 > 0:54:30"to summon the presences of, or recollect the absences of slaves.
0:54:31 > 0:54:35"There's no 300-foot tower, there's no small bench by the road."
0:54:39 > 0:54:42This is now a place to sit and remember.
0:54:46 > 0:54:48"She shouted, 'Let the children come',
0:54:48 > 0:54:51"and they ran from the trees toward her.
0:54:51 > 0:54:53"'Let your mothers hear you laugh',
0:54:53 > 0:54:56"she told them, and the woods rang.
0:54:56 > 0:54:59"The adults looked on and could not help smiling.
0:54:59 > 0:55:02"Then, 'Let the grown men come', she shouted.
0:55:02 > 0:55:06"They stepped out one-by-one from among the ringing trees.
0:55:06 > 0:55:09"'Let your wives and your children see you dance', she told them,
0:55:09 > 0:55:12"and ground life shuddered under their feet.
0:55:12 > 0:55:15"Finally, she called the women to her.
0:55:15 > 0:55:16"'Cry', she told them.
0:55:16 > 0:55:19"'For the living and the dead. Just cry.'
0:55:19 > 0:55:22"And without covering their eyes, the women let loose.
0:55:22 > 0:55:26"It started that way, laughing children, dancing men,
0:55:26 > 0:55:28"crying women, then it got mixed up.
0:55:28 > 0:55:32"Women stopped crying and danced, and men sat down and cried,
0:55:32 > 0:55:35"children danced, women laughed, children cried until,
0:55:35 > 0:55:39"exhausted and riven, all and each lay about the clearing
0:55:39 > 0:55:41"damp and gasping for breath."
0:56:09 > 0:56:15Through that account of a woman who would rather kill her child
0:56:15 > 0:56:17than see it sold into slavery,
0:56:17 > 0:56:20I came to understand something about a history that I'd been studying
0:56:20 > 0:56:22that I had never understood before.
0:56:25 > 0:56:29Just the way the language moved, the music, the underlying music
0:56:29 > 0:56:32of the language, was so delightful to me,
0:56:32 > 0:56:34it was so...
0:56:34 > 0:56:37It was just so intensely pleasurable a reading experience,
0:56:37 > 0:56:40notwithstanding the heart-breaking subject matter,
0:56:40 > 0:56:42that I remember thinking,
0:56:42 > 0:56:44"Not only is this the way that I want to write one day,
0:56:44 > 0:56:47"this is the only thing I ever really want to read."
0:56:47 > 0:56:51And that there was this literary master being introduced to me
0:56:51 > 0:56:56who looked in some way like me meant the world to me.
0:56:58 > 0:57:01# Roll up the bed
0:57:01 > 0:57:03# Springs hard as lead
0:57:03 > 0:57:06# Feet like old Ned
0:57:06 > 0:57:08# Wish I was dead
0:57:08 > 0:57:12# All my night through I've been so black and blue...#
0:57:12 > 0:57:16Singing was never just entertaining,
0:57:16 > 0:57:18it was always about something,
0:57:18 > 0:57:23it was like a powerful, rhythmic sound of poetry,
0:57:23 > 0:57:26spirituals, the blues.
0:57:26 > 0:57:29You know, it's always interesting to me that the blues
0:57:29 > 0:57:31- is about lost love...- Yes.
0:57:31 > 0:57:37..where a man loves a woman or "Where's my man?"
0:57:37 > 0:57:40But they're never stingy.
0:57:40 > 0:57:47For me, it's identifiably part and heart of the black culture,
0:57:47 > 0:57:51is that generosity and that openness.
0:57:51 > 0:57:57Somebody once said nobody loves like black people.
0:58:11 > 0:58:14"When spring comes to the city,
0:58:14 > 0:58:18"people notice one another in the road.
0:58:20 > 0:58:26"On trolleys and park benches they settle thighs
0:58:26 > 0:58:30"on a seat in which hundreds have done it too.
0:58:34 > 0:58:38"Copper coins dropped in the pan
0:58:38 > 0:58:40"have been swallowed by children
0:58:40 > 0:58:43"and tested by gypsies,
0:58:43 > 0:58:46"but it's still money and people smile at that.
0:58:48 > 0:58:54"It's the time of year when the city urges contradiction most,
0:58:54 > 0:58:58"giving you a taste for a single room,
0:58:58 > 0:59:00"occupied by you alone,
0:59:00 > 0:59:05"as well as craving to share it with someone you passed in the street."
0:59:10 > 0:59:14I love the lyricism of her writing.
0:59:16 > 0:59:19You read a paragraph and think, "Oh, that is wonderful.
0:59:19 > 0:59:23"Why can't I think like that, or talk like that?"
0:59:23 > 0:59:25Because there is music in her writing.
0:59:28 > 0:59:33It's free-form, fragmented, wheeling around in time,
0:59:33 > 0:59:34just like jazz.
0:59:39 > 0:59:43Toni is influenced by a multiplicity of traditions...
0:59:46 > 0:59:49..African-American cultural traditions...
0:59:51 > 0:59:55..as well as high modernist traditions,
0:59:55 > 1:00:00and so many of the things that we might find, um...curious...
1:00:03 > 1:00:06..such as disrespect for chronology,
1:00:06 > 1:00:09are traits that we can find in masterworks
1:00:09 > 1:00:11of 20th-century literature.
1:00:12 > 1:00:15She has appropriated those techniques
1:00:15 > 1:00:17in telling these tales
1:00:17 > 1:00:21that have nothing to do with the high modernist tradition.
1:00:24 > 1:00:26"I'm crazy about this city.
1:00:26 > 1:00:30"Daylight slants like a razor, cutting the buildings in half.
1:00:32 > 1:00:35"The city in 1926.
1:00:36 > 1:00:39"At last, at last everything's ahead.
1:00:41 > 1:00:43"Here comes the new. Look out!
1:00:43 > 1:00:47"There goes the sad stuff, the bad stuff,
1:00:47 > 1:00:50"the things nobody could help stuff.
1:00:50 > 1:00:54"The way everybody was then and there, forget that -
1:00:54 > 1:00:56"history is over."
1:01:00 > 1:01:04I'll never forget that image in Beloved...
1:01:06 > 1:01:08..where there are two little...
1:01:08 > 1:01:15The imprints of the two little hands of a child on a cake,
1:01:15 > 1:01:17you know?
1:01:17 > 1:01:19It's just a...
1:01:20 > 1:01:23It takes one's breath away
1:01:23 > 1:01:29in the way that many poems,
1:01:29 > 1:01:32but few novels do.
1:01:32 > 1:01:34In Toni Morrison's writing,
1:01:34 > 1:01:37the pressure per square inch is very high.
1:01:42 > 1:01:45Toni Morrison won the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved
1:01:45 > 1:01:47and went on to win the Nobel.
1:01:49 > 1:01:52She says two things matter to her,
1:01:52 > 1:01:54being a writer, and a mother.
1:01:54 > 1:01:55She's always been both.
1:02:02 > 1:02:04Yeah, that's the picture.
1:02:04 > 1:02:10Sadly, her second son, Slade, died five years ago of cancer.
1:02:13 > 1:02:18She lives surrounded by his paintings, and his picture.
1:02:24 > 1:02:27"'They will blow it', she thought.
1:02:27 > 1:02:32"'Each will cling to a sad little story of hurt and sorrows.
1:02:34 > 1:02:35"'What waste.'
1:02:36 > 1:02:42"She knew from personal experience how hard loving was,
1:02:42 > 1:02:46"how selfish and how easily sundered.
1:02:46 > 1:02:50"Withholding sex, or relying on it,
1:02:50 > 1:02:54"ignoring children or devouring them.
1:02:56 > 1:03:00"'I was pretty once,' she thought, 'real pretty.'
1:03:00 > 1:03:03"'And I believed it was enough.'
1:03:06 > 1:03:10"And now she lived alone in the wilderness,
1:03:10 > 1:03:12"knitting and tatting away,
1:03:12 > 1:03:15"grateful that at last
1:03:15 > 1:03:20"Sweet Jesus had given her a forgetfulness blanket,
1:03:20 > 1:03:25"along with a little pillow of wisdom
1:03:25 > 1:03:28"to comfort her in old age."
1:03:31 > 1:03:33I like her.