Toni Morrison and Universal Writing

“I felt that nobody wrote about those black people the way I knew those people to be. And I was aware of that fact, that it was rare. Aware that there was an enormous amount of apology going on, even in the best writing. But more important than that, there was so much explanation…the black writers always explained something to somebody else. And I didn’t want to explain anything to anybody else! …If I could understand Emily Dickinson—you know, she wasn’t writing for a black audience or a white audience; she was writing whatever she wrote! I think if you do that, if you hone in on what you write, it will be universal…not the other way around!”

Historically, writing has been highly charged with tensions surrounding race and gender.  Women in the 19^th century were confined to only reading the Bible or “more feminine works of literature” such as poetry. Slaves were forbidden to learn how to read or write in many of the colonies. Beyond the physical act of reading and writing, all literature by its very nature approaches race and gender in some form – even if not intended so by the author. Every time one opens a novel or begins an essay, he or she is reading a story or an idea written by an author who consciously and subconsciously is guided by the experiences he or she has had and the biases he or she has been socialized into having. What I find interesting about Toni Morrison is that she approaches race and gender in her writing not from an emotional viewpoint but from an inquisitive one. In an interview with the Paris review, Morrison responded to the question of whether she wrote to discover her feelings towards a subject with, “No, I know how I feel… A book is ‘this may be what I believe, but suppose I am wrong . . . what could it be?’ Or, ‘I don’t know what it is, but I am interested in finding out what it might mean to me, as well as to other people,’” (Morrison, “Toni Morrison, The Art of Fiction No. 134”).  I think this is what makes Morrison’s work universal. It invites all people to read her work. It is educational but also not rigid in its lesson. Her work provokes thought and self-exploration. She forces readers to recognize their own beliefs and question why a story makes them feel they way they do. Are they uncomfortable? Sad? Confused? Angry? Readers all experience some form of emotion when they read, at least when reading good literature. So, as readers, it is our responsibility to acknowledge these emotions and explore what they mean about how we view ourselves in the context of our sole selves paired with in the greater context of society.