Literary giant Toni Morrison’s legacy celebrated in annual authors showcase

American Nobel laureate Toni Morisson, smiles during a press conference at the Louvre Museum in Paris, Wednesday Nov. 8, 2006. She will hold a sold-out lecture series at the Louvre on themes of exile, exclusion and being an outsider, talks to reporters Wednesday about her plans.(AP Photo/Michel Euler)

By Elaijah Gibbs-Jones
NABJ Monitor

NABJ authors took a moment of silence Wednesday to reflect the memory of literary giant Toni Morrison, a Nobel-prize winning author, who passed away on Monday.

Author Alexis Yancey, who organized the convention’s authors showcase, said she was greatly influenced by Morrison.

“She is an American treasure because she was able to relate the black experience to every American whether you’re Asian, Caucasian, Indian or Hispanic,’’ said Yancey, co-founder of NABJ-TV. “She was able to take you on a journey to really know what our lives have been like.”

The annual NABJ Convention Authors Showcase includes nearly 12 hours of programming in which NABJ journalists interview a collection of celebrity and NABJ-member authors.

Many of Morrison’s fans, peers and friends took time to remember her impact on their lives. A great amount of reflection focused on Morrison’s use of language and how it has led her audiences to dive deeper into a variety of perspectives.

Marilyn Mobley, an English professor at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland and Toni Morrison scholar, invested her life into teaching the lessons of Morrison to many students. Mobley reflected with tears in her eyes on the passing of the trailblazing author.

“It’s very significant in an almost divine spiritual way that we would lose one of our greatest writers and greatest thinkers at the point that this country is struggling,” Mobley said. “She has given us her very best and it is up to us now to write, tell stories and think about how we love each other. It’s up to us now.”