Reviews
" The Source of Self-Regard speaks to today's social and political moment as directly as this morning's headlines... a call to action... Morrison tackles headfirst the weighty issues that have long troubled America's conscience... profoundly insightful...Is it a collection worth reading? Undoubtedly... Throughout the collection she calls on us to do what she knows, what we should all know, is possible: "To lessen suffering, to know the truth and tell it, to raise the bar of humane expectation." --NPR "Clearly we do not deserve Morrison, and clearly we need her badly...In this collection of nonfiction written over the past four decades, the revered (and sometimes controversial) author reinforces her status as a piercing and visionary analyst of history, society, literature, language, and, always, race... the book explodes into pure brilliance... despite its overflowing content, the book still inspires the desire for more... The Source of Self-Regard is the definitive statement that Morrison, who has thought as much as anyone about the ways countries, cultures, and people fail and hurt each other and themselves, still believes that we can be better." --The Boston Globe "Brilliantly incisive essays, speeches, and meditations considering race, power, identity, and art... Powerful, highly compelling pieces from one of our greatest writers." --Kirkus (starred review) "Morrison turns a critical eye on race, social politics, money, feminism, culture, and the press, with the essential mandate that each of us bears the responsibility for reaching beyond our superficial identities and circumstances for a closer look at what it means to be human." --Booklist (starred review) "Some superb pieces headline this rich collection...Prescient and highly relevant to the present political moment..." --Publishers Weekly, "Brilliantly incisive essays, speeches, and meditations considering race, power, identity, and art... Powerful, highly compelling pieces from one of our greatest writers." -- Kirkus (starred review), "Brilliantly incisive essays, speeches, and meditations considering race, power, identity, and art... Powerful, highly compelling pieces from one of our greatest writers." --Kirkus (starred review) "Some superb pieces headline this rich collection...Prescient and highly relevant to the present political moment..." --Publishers Weekly
Table of Content
Peril Part I THE FOREIGNER'S HOME The Dead of September 11 The Foreigner's Home Racism and Fascism Home Wartalk The War on Error A Race in Mind: The Press in Deed Moral Inhabitants The Price of Wealth, the Cost of Care The Habit of Art The Individual Artist Arts Advocacy Sarah Lawrence Commencement Address The Slavebody and the Blackbody Harlem on My Mind: Contesting Memory-- Meditation on Museums, Culture, and Integration Women, Race, and Memory Literature and Public Life The Nobel Lecture in Literature Cinderella's Stepsisters The Future of Time: Literature and Diminished Expectations Interlude BLACK MATTER(S) Tribute to Martin Luther King Jr. Race Matters Black Matter(s) Unspeakable Things Unspoken: The Afro-American Presence in American Literature Academic Whispers 198 Gertrude Stein and the Difference She Makes 205 Hard, True, and Lasting 220 Part II GOD'S LANGUAGE James Baldwin Eulogy The Site of Memory God's Language Grendel and His Mother The Writer Before the Page The Trouble with Paradise On Beloved Chinua Achebe Introduction of Peter Sellars Tribute to Romare Bearden Faulkner and Women The Source of Self-Regard Rememory Memory, Creation, and Fiction Goodbye to All That: Race, Surrogacy, and Farewell Invisible Ink: Reading the Writing and Writing the Reading Sources
