While I am saddened by the loss of Toni Morrison (2/18/31 - 8/5/19), the power of a writer is that their message lives on to teach more generations in the future.
When I heard that she had passed, I thought about those students I had that were assigned her books for summer reading in my AP Language class back in the 90's. I assigned Bluest Eye one summer and Beloved another summer. I always held my breath until school started because I thought that if I were ever challenged by a parent or an administrator for my controversial choice, I would go down swinging and be willing to be fired for my choices. I also wonder what my students really thought about my choices. I saw one of my alumni a few years back and she said that what she remembered from my AP class was that I had them read the most interesting, non traditional literature. Nice!
I even gave my youngest son Beloved to read when his 8th grade English teacher said she wanted them to read books by Newberry medal winners. I sent her an email to get an exception for my son and let her know that he would be reading a book from a medal winning author, but to prepare him for high school, he would be reading Beloved, which won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Not only did she let him read it, but he did an oral book report using items as "symbols" for theme. I still laugh about his using the cow by my desk and how did he talk about the way the black men and masculinity were portrayed in the book to a class of 8th graders and to a former elementary teacher who I am pretty sure never read the book? How did he talk about atrocity without revealing the real horror so that no one would be the wiser? And what kind of mother puts this in the hands of her son? I think, like the quote above, it was a mother's message to him to keep his eyes open in school. To not turn away from the horror but also to critically refuse to succumb to the horror. Not sure if he would agree with me, but as a parent, I cannot take back how I raise my children.
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