Top 51 Quotes by Toni Morrison

I think some aspects of writing can be taught. Obviously, you can't teach vision or talent. But you can help with comfort.

If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it.

You need a whole community to raise a child. I have raised two children, alone.

Somebody has to take responsibility for being a leader.

If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, you must be the one to write it.

The body is ready to have babies. Nature wants it done then, when the body can handle it, not after 40, when the income can handle it.

Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another.

I'm always annoyed about why black people have to bear the brunt of everybody else's contempt. If we are not totally understanding and smiling, suddenly we're demons.

All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was.

The ability of writers to imagine what is not the self, to familiarize the strange and mystify the familiar, is the test of their power.