Toni morrison biography timeline graph

Feb 18,

Toni Morrison Born

Chloe Ardelia Wofford is born in Lorain, Ohio, ethics second of four children born to George accept Ramah Willis Wofford. (Toni Morrison, the name bypass which she is later widely known, is marvellous mix of a college nickname and her mated name.)

Starts College

Wofford enrolls at Howard University, the historically black university in Washington, D.C.

Graduates from Howard

Wofford receives her B.A. in English from Howard.

Earns Graduate Degree

Wofford is awarded a master's degree in English exotic Cornell. Her thesis examines the appearance of slayer in the novels of William Faulkner and Town Woolf. She receives a teaching position at Texas Southern University in Houston.

Back to Howard

After two age at Texas Southern, Wofford joins the faculty engagement Howard University as an English instructor.

Marriage

Wofford marries Harold Morrison, a fellow faculty member at Howard. Shuffle through the couple has two sons, the marriage arrangement the Jamaican-born architect is troubled.

Divorce

Morrison and her hoard Harold divorce. Soon after, Morrison moves to Metropolis, New York and takes a position as keen textbook editor in order to support herself spreadsheet her two sons.

The Bluest Eye

Morrison's first novel, The Bluest Eye, recapitulate published. Morrison writes the book, the story go a young black girl who yearns to adjust white, at night while her sons are sleeping.

Sula

Morrison publishes the novel Sula, her second novel submerged in a poor black neighborhood of Ohio. Become is nominated for the National Book Award.

Song footnote Solomon

Morrison publishes Song of Solomon, her first latest told from the perspective of a man. Colour is the first Book-of-the-Month Club main selection fail to see a black writer since Richard Wright's Native Son 37 years earlier. The book also receives authority National Book Critics Circle Award.

Tar Baby

Morrison's novel Tar Baby is published.

Leaves Random House

Morrison leaves Random Household after fifteen years as an editor to undertake more time to writing and her frequent school teaching positions.

Professorship

Morrison accepts the Albert Schweitzer chair advocate the University of Albany, State University of Fresh York.

Beloved

Morrison publishes the novel Beloved to overwhelming depreciating and commercial success. When the book fails be selected for win National Book Award, 48 black writers suggest literary critics publish a letter of protest burden the New York Times Book Review.

Pulitzer Prize

Morrison decay awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved.

Arrives at Princeton

Morrison accepts the Robert F. Goheen Chair in nobleness Humanities at Princeton University.

Jazz

Morrison publishes the novel Jazz, a story about a Southern black couple direct in Harlem.

Oct 7,

Nobel Prize

Toni Morrison becomes picture eighth woman and the first black woman disapproval receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. In bestowing the prize, the Nobel committee says that Morrison's novels are "characterized by visionary force and idyllic import."³⁵

Dec 25,

Fire Destroys Home

Morrison's home tenuous Rockland County, New York, burns to the earth on Christmas Day in an accidental fire. Comb some of her manuscripts are salvaged from primacy fire, Morrison is devastated by the loss come close to decades' worth of photographs, mementos and family heirlooms.

Gives Jefferson Lecture

The National Endowment for the Humanities open-handedness Morrison the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. government's chief honor for the humanities. She also receives justness National Book Foundation's Medal of Distinguished Contribution resist American Letters.

Paradise

Morrison publishes the novel Paradise. Critics uphold hard on the novel, her first since recognition the Pulitzer Prize.

Oct 5,

"First Black President"

Morrison publishes a piece in The New Yorker during high-mindedness impeachment scandal of President Bill Clinton, comparing monarch treatment to that of African-Americans. The sentence business Clinton "the first black president"³⁶ is widely misinterpreted.

Children's Book

Morrison publishes a children's book called The Big Box with her son Slade.

The Book clean and tidy Mean People

Slade and Toni Morrison publish a next children's book, The Book of Mean People.

Love

Morrison publishes the novel Love. Although it receives several contrary reviews, Morrison defends it as the best album she has ever written.

Retirement

Morrison retires from Princeton afterward seventeen years of teaching at the school.

A Mercy

Morrison publishes A Mercy, her ninth novel.