Nobel and Pulitzer Prize Winner Toni Morrison 

A film documenting the life of famed author Toni Morrison will air tonight, March 8, just in time for international Women’s day. AARP Movies for Grownups Screenings presents The Pieces I Am, a 2019 documentary by director Timothy Greenfield-Sanders.

(Follow the link to discover how to gain internet access to this 119-minute broadcast.)https://watch.aarp.org/aarpmfg/play/65a964f0bc5ffc0039ae0a3e

I first read Toni Morrison’s critically acclaimed Song of Solomon in 1977 before she’d garnered the national attention that would result from her 1987 bestseller, Beloved, based on the true story of a runaway slave. Ms. Morrison would win a Pulitzer Prize for the book in 1988, with The New York Times calling it “The best work of American fiction of the past twenty-five years.” 

Ms. Morrison’s tales are powerful allegories that shine the light on the history of racism against the African American community, and in 1993 the Nobel Prize committee awarded her The Nobel Prize in Literature, making her the first Black woman to receive it.

President Barack Obama presented Toni Morrison with the Presidential Medal of Freedom on May 29, 2012. She was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 2020.

The trailer for tonight’s documentary calls it an “artful and intimate meditation as the legendary storyteller examines her life, her works, and the powerful themes she has confronted throughout her literary career. Toni Morrison leads an assembly of her peers, critics, and colleagues on an exploration of race, history, the United States, and the human condition.”

Happy International Women’s Day