Trailer | PASSAGES: On Morrison

In the words of drag performer Dorian Corey, shade requires you to "go to the fine point." To throw shade—to insult your subject, either a text or a person, with maximum flare and make it fun for an audience—you have to pick out extremely precise details, naming the specificities of what you dislike.  Toni Morrison was an exceptionally close reader, and this enabled her to be a master of shade.  At a celebratory event at the end of her tour for ON MORRISON, Namwali Serpell discusses Morrison's shade as critical praxis with poet, memoirist, and host of "Vibe Check" Saeed Jones. They read and open up Morrison's excoriating review of Regina Nadelson's Who Is Angela Davis?, an unauthorized biography of the young revolutionary. The review was originally published in 1972 in The New York Times. Here is the passage Saeed reads of Toni Morrison's review: "On the other hand, who is Regina Nadelson and why is she behaving like Harriet Beecher Stowe, another simpatico white girl who felt she was privy to the secret of how black revolutionaries got that way? How Liza could get to the point of actually crossing the ice or how Angela Davis got to the point of actually joining the Communist party was quite naturally that white intelligence informed them both; and since Harriet was prey to the scientific racism of her day she attributed Liza's feistiness to the genetic transference of information via white blood; but Regina lives in the 20th century and is an enlightened racist who knows about cultural determinism, which is to say Angela got her courage not from white blood but white culture and that her sublime militancy was spawned by white teachers, white boyfriends, white psychoanalysts, and a special brand of white terror perpetrated on some respectable colored folks for how else could she dally with Black Panthers and fight Ronald Reagan and carry the Card, for surely no black folks influenced her (except abstract victims and her middle class—read white-oriented—family) which is why Miss Regina who knew Angela at Elisabeth Irwin High School didn't take the trouble to interview any blacks as she went about collecting her data and rejecting all eyeball to eyeball or flesh to flesh contact with any of the 'other blacks' with whom Angela tried to form a Black Student Union or the 'adherents' that were drawn into it or the 'other black groups' she worked with before joining the party or those other irrelevant black souls Angela knew all her life, for, as Miss Regina's labels show, Angela's 'people' were not worth talking to anyway for whenever she needed a black view all she had to do was quote Frazier, DuBois, Baldwin or some other black with a real name, and not even Angela herself was a reliable source, for in the chapter 'Conversations in Jail' Miss Regina quotes exactly 23 words Angela actually spoke and they were directed to Margaret Burnham, the rest of them being culled from writings and speeches, so the consequence of this singularly parochial research is that Angela Davis is revealed to be pretty much like Regina Nadelson, an American. 'People see her as a black leader and as a liberated woman. There is something else that matters to me: she is an American.' And as for her personal regard for her subject, Miss Regina likes her; 'She is kind and funny.' Yessum, Miss Regina. We all are."  You can find an abridged transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold. PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

Every city has a pulse, a rhythm, a certain way it's touched by light. Continuing on tour for ON MORRISON, Namwali lands in sunny Oakland, California, where she reads Morrison's striking, swinging portrait of Harlem's jazz age with poet and writer Cathy Park Hong. At an event with the Bay Area Book Festival, Namwali and Cathy discuss slant rhymes, slanted grammars, and the slanting light Morrison wields in the passage to depict the City's beauty, violence, music, and love.  Here's the passage Cathy reads from Morrison's JAZZ:  "I'm crazy about this City. Daylight slants like a razor cutting the buildings in half. In the top half I see looking faces and it's not easy to tell which are people, which the work of stonemasons. Below is shadow where any blasé thing takes place: clarinets and lovemaking, fists and the voices of sorrowful women. A city like this one makes me dream tall and feel in on things. Hep. It's the bright steel rocking above the shade below that does it. When I look over strips of green grass lining the river, at church steeples and into the cream-and-copper halls of apartment buildings, I'm strong. Alone, yes, but top-notch and indestructible—like the City in 1926 when all the wars are over and there will never be another one. The people down there in the shadow are happy about that. At last, at last, everything's ahead. The smart ones say so and people listening to them and reading what they write down agree: Here comes the new. Look out. There goes the sad stuff. The bad stuff. The things-nobody-could-help stuff. The way everybody was then and there. Forget that. History is over, you all, and everything's ahead at last." You can find an abridged transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold. PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

In the threshold between awake and sleeping, a woman in a yellow dress strolls the aisles of a grocery store. Continuing on tour for ON MORRISON, Namwali Serpell travels to Philadelphia to talk with writer Angela Flournoy about a scene from TAR BABY. Speaking at the Free Library, they trace the novel's invocation of myths and masks, Morrison's paradoxical presentation of stereotypes, and the surreal, slippery images that make the scene in the grocery store stick. Here is the passage Angela reads from Morrison's TAR BABY: "The vision itself was a woman much too tall. Under her long canary yellow dress Jadine knew there was too much hip, too much bust. The agency would laugh her out of the lobby, so why was she and everybody else in the store transfixed? The height? The skin like tar against the canary yellow dress? The woman walked down the aisle as though her many-­colored sandals were pressing gold tracks on the floor. Two upside-­down V's were scored into each of her cheeks, her hair was wrapped in a gelée as yellow as her dress…. The woman leaned into the dairy section and opened a carton from which she selected three eggs. Then she put her right elbow into the palm of her left hand and held the eggs aloft between earlobe and shoulder. She looked up then and they saw something in her eyes so powerful it had burnt away the eyelashes. ….the woman reached into the pocket of her yellow dress and put a ten-louis piece on the counter and walked away, away, gold tracking the floor and leaving them all behind....   Jadine followed her profile, then her back as she passed the store window—followed her all the way to the edge of the world where the plate glass stopped. And there, just there—a moment before the cataclysm when all loveliness and life and breath in the world was about to disappear—the woman turned her head sharply around to the left and looked right at Jadine. Turned those eyes too beautiful for eyelashes on Jadine and, with a small parting of her lips, shot an arrow of saliva between her teeth down to the pavement and the hearts below." You can find an abridged transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold. PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

BELOVED is a holy space made of words. Across the street from Washington Square Park, in New York City's historic Judson Memorial Church, Namwali Serpell, writer Vinson Cunningham, and our live audience invoke the hauntings of Morrison's most celebrated novel. Reading from BELOVED's final, stunning page, Namwali and Vinson trace how Morrison imbues meaning on the level of syntax and crafts her words into a story that cannot be forgotten.  Here is the passage Vinson reads from Toni Morrison's BELOVED: "It was not a story to pass on.  They forgot her like a bad dream. After they made up their tales, shaped and decorated them, those that saw her that day on the porch quickly and deliberately forgot her. It took longer for those who had spoken to her, lived with her, fallen in love with her, to forget, until they realized they couldn't remember or repeat a single thing she said, and began to believe that, other than what they themselves were thinking, she hadn't said anything at all. So, in the end, they forgot her too. Remembering seemed unwise. They never knew where or why she crouched, or whose was the underwater face she needed like that. Where the memory of the smile under her chin might have been and was not, a latch latched and lichen attached its apple-green bloom to the metal. What made her think her fingernails could open locks the rain rained on?  It was not a story to pass on.  So they forgot her. Like an unpleasant dream during a troubling sleep. Occasionally, however, the rustle of a skirt hushes when they wake, and the knuckles brushing a cheek in sleep seem to belong to the sleeper. Sometimes the photograph of a close friend or relative—looked at too long—shifts, and something more familiar than the dear face itself moves there. They can touch it if they like, but don't, because they know things will never be the same if they do.  This is not a story to pass on.  Down by the stream in back of 124 her footprints come and go, come and go. They are so familiar. Should a child, an adult place his feet in them, they will fit. Take them out and they disappear again as though nobody ever walked there.  By and by all trace is gone, and what is forgotten is not only the footprints but the water too and what it is down there. The rest is weather. Not the breath of the disremembered and unaccounted for, but wind in the eaves, or spring ice thawing too quickly. Just weather. Certainly no clamor for a kiss.  Beloved." You can find an abridged transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold. PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.  

Toni Morrison didn't want a monument or statue erected in her honor; she wanted a dedicated reading room in her hometown public library, a space that could allow for change and continuous engagement with her work. In this episode, Namwali Serpell visits the Toni Morrison Reading Room in the Lorain Public Library, before heading to a tour event at the CityClub Cleveland to open up a passage from Morrison's novel PARADISE alongside poet and writer Kortney Morrow.  Here is the passage that Kortney reads from Morrison's PARADISE: "Beyond, to his left, [Deacon] could hear schoolchildren group-reciting a poem he'd learned by rote too, except he had had to hear Dunbar's lines only once to memorize them completely and forever. When he and Steward had enlisted there was a lot to learn—from how to tie an army tie to how to pack a bag. And just as they had in [their] schoolhouse, they had been first to understand everything, remember everything.  But none of it was as good as what they learned at home, sitting on the floor in a firelit room, listening to war stories; to stories of great migrations—those who made it and those who did not; to the failures and triumphs of intelli- gent men—their fear, their bravery, their confusion; to tales of love deep and permanent. All there in the one book they owned then. Black leather covers with gold lettering; the pages thinner than young leaves, than petals. The spine frayed into webbing at the top, the corners fingered down to skin. The strong words, strange at first, becoming familiar, gaining weight and hypnotic beauty the more they heard them, made them their own. As Deek drove north on Central, it and the side streets seemed to him as satisfactory as ever. Quiet white and yellow houses full of industry; and in them were elegant black women at useful tasks; orderly cupboards minus surfeit or miserliness; linen laundered and ironed to perfection; good meat seasoned and ready for roasting. It was a view he would be damned if… the idleness of the young would disturb." You can find an abridged transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold. PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

Continuing our tour of Ohio, Namwali joins writer and educator Dionne Custer Edwards to discuss ON MORRISON at the Bexley Public Library. They read and open up a passage of Morrison's SULA, a brimming scene of friendship and play between the two central characters, Sula and Nel. Dionne and Namwali explore the innocence of the girls' mirrored play with twigs and grass, but also the undertones of maturation, as Nel and Sula hover on the threshold between the girls they have been and the women they are actively becoming.  Here is the passage Dionne reads from Toni Morrison's SULA: "Sula lifted her head and joined Nel in the grass play. In concert, without ever meeting each other's eyes, they stroked the blades up and down, up and down. Nel found a thick twig and, with her thumbnail, pulled away its bark until it was stripped to a smooth, creamy innocence. Sula looked about and found one too. When both twigs were undressed Nel moved easily to the next stage and began tearing up rooted grass to make a bare spot of earth. When a generous clearing was made, Sula traced intricate patterns in it with her twig. At first Nel was content to do the same. But soon she grew impatient and poked her twig rhythmically and intensely into the earth, making a small neat hole that grew deeper and wider with the least manipulation of her twig. Sula copied her, and soon each had a hole the size of a cup. Nel began a more strenuous digging and, rising to her knee, was careful to scoop out the dirt as she made her hole deeper. Together they worked until the two holes were one and the same. When the depression was the size of a small dishpan, Nel's twig broke. With a gesture of disgust she threw the pieces into the hole they had made. Sula threw hers in too. Nel saw a bottle cap and tossed it in as well. Each then looked around for more debris to throw into the hole: paper, bits of glass, butts of cigarettes, until all of the small defiling things they could find were collected there. Carefully they replaced the soil and covered the entire grave with uprooted grass. Neither one had spoken a word." You can find an abridged transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. Join us for a live taping of PASSAGES: On Morrison on June 4th at Liz's Book Bar in Brooklyn, NY.  You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold. PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

For the launch of Ohio's year-long, state-wide celebration of Toni Morrison, Namwali Serpell flies to Columbus to talk with poet and essayist Hanif Abdurraqib. With the help of the audience, they read the ending of Morrison's SONG OF SOLOMON and then open up the scene's quiet violence and ambiguous action. The passage leads them to discuss the challenges of adapting Morrison's novels for film, the power of evoking the inexplicable, and the influence of African folk tales on Morrison's work.  Here is the passage Hanif reads from SONG OF SOLOMON: "Now he knew why he loved her so. Without ever leaving the ground, she could fly. 'There must be another one like you,' he whispered to her. 'There's got to be at least one more woman like you.' Even as he knelt over her, he knew there wouldn't be another mistake; that the minute he stood up Guitar would try to blow his head off. He stood up. 'Guitar!' he shouted. Tar tar tar, said the hills. 'Over here, brother man! Can you see me?' Milkman cupped his mouth with one hand and waved the other over his head. 'Here I am!' Am am am am, said the rocks. 'You want me? Huh? You want my life?' Life life life life. Squatting on the edge of the other flat-headed rock with only the night to cover him, Guitar smiled over the barrel of his rifle. 'My man,' he murmured to himself. 'My main man.' He put the rifle on the ground and stood up. Milkman stopped waving and narrowed his eyes. He could just make out Guitar's head and shoulders in the dark. 'You want my life?' Milkman was not shouting now. 'You need it? Here.' Without wiping away the tears, taking a deep breath, or even bending his knees—he leaped. As fleet and bright as a lodestar he wheeled toward Guitar and it did not matter which one of them would give up his ghost in the killing arms of his brother. For now he knew what Shalimar knew: If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it." You can find an abridged episode transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub.   Join us for a live taping of PASSAGES: On Morrison on June 4th at Liz's Book Bar in Brooklyn, NY.  You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold.  PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

Namwali Serpell kicks off the tour for her new book ON MORRISON at the First Parish Church in Cambridge, MA, in conversation with poet Tracy K. Smith. Together, they read the opening of THE BLUEST EYE, Toni Morrison's debut novel, and discuss all that the passage emits and erases. They also explore how the cultural treatment of Morrison as a literary icon or monument has obscured a true appreciation of her literary form, an appreciation that comes from turning to the page.  Here is the passage Tracy reads from Morrison's THE BLUEST EYE: "Quiet as it's kept, there were no marigolds in the fall of 1941. We thought, at the time, that it was because Pecola was having her father's baby that the marigolds did not grow. A little examination and much less melancholy would have proved to us that our seeds were not the only ones that did not sprout; nobody's did. Not even the gardens fronting the lake showed marigolds that year. But so deeply concerned were we with the health and safe delivery of Pecola's baby we could think of nothing but our own magic: if we planted the seeds, and said the right words over them, they would blossom, and everything would be all right. It was a long time before my sister and I admitted to ourselves that no green was going to spring from our seeds. Once we knew, our guilt was relieved only by fights and mutual accusations about who was to blame. For years I thought my sister was right: it was my fault. I had planted them too far down in the earth. It never occurred to either of us that the earth itself might have been unyielding. We had dropped our seeds in our own little plot of black dirt just as Pecola's father had dropped his seeds in his own plot of black dirt. Our innocence and faith were no more productive than his lust or despair. What is clear now is that of all of that hope, fear, lust, love, and grief, nothing remains but Pecola and the unyielding earth. Cholly Breedlove is dead; our innocence too. The seeds shriveled and died; her baby too. There is really nothing more to say—except why. But since why is difficult to handle, one must take refuge in how." You can find the episode transcript and additional show notes here at Literary Hub. Join us for a live taping of PASSAGES: On Morrison on June 4th at Liz's Book Bar in Brooklyn, NY.  You can buy Namwali Serpell's ON MORRISON at this link and anywhere books are sold.  PASSAGES: On Morrison is a Random House production, hosted by Namwali Serpell. The podcast was created and produced by Sara McCrea. Sound design and technical direction by John DeLore. Campaign strategy and development, media partnerships by Carrie Neill. Publicity and tour coordination by Peter Dyer.

PASSAGES: On Morrison is a podcast that takes reading on the road. At each stop on our tour, Namwali Serpell and fellow writers open up a different passage of Toni Morrison's prose, in front of a live audience.  You can purchase the book ON MORRISON by Namwali Serpell through https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/752344/on-morrison-by-namwali-serpell/.  This podcast is a production of the Random House Publishing Group.