Toni Morrison Interview

Toni Morrison is a Noble Prize winning American author. Some of her most popular novels include Love, Beloved, The Bluest Eye and the Song of Solomon. She also is a professor and editor. In her interview with Charlie Rose she talks about when she went from an editor to an author and how it was a scary but exhilarating experience. She had two children to support and no stable job and had to take a chance with her writing. She also talks about how glad she is that made that choice. Morrison also talks about how working as an editor before becoming a writer helped her as a writer. She also realized how much writer’s hate their work being critiqued because they fall in love with what they write and don't want to change it. Writers must learn to be more willing to keep changing things because each time they change something it gets stronger. The saying “love is blind” works for a writer’s work too. Just because they love a character or a part of their story doesn’t mean it is well written or that it doesn’t need further revision.

I thought it was very interesting when Charlie rose asks Toni Morrison what she would say at her last lecture. When he suggest that she would talk about being African American women or a writer she replies that she would not want to talk about either, but instead “how hard it is to become and remain human.” This comes through in her writing because she explores this subject within her characters with how they relate to the world and relationships.