Toni Morrison, beloved author & Nobel Prize winner, dead at 88

Today the NAACP released the following statement on the passing of award-winning novelist, Toni Morrison:

Our hearts are heavy over the loss of our sister, Toni Morrison. Morrison, a renowned teacher, professor, and award-winning novelist, revealed the unspoken truths of Black life in America and provided us with a deeper understanding of what it meant to be loved. Among the many prestigious awards Morrison received throughout her life, she was notably the first black woman to win a Nobel Prize in Literature. She also received an NAACP Image Award for her novel, Love. Her legacy will live on through her contributions to the literary community, and the world as a whole.

The Nobel Prize-winning US author Toni Morrison has died at the age of 88. The Morrison family confirmed "with profound sadness" that Morrison had died "following a short illness". The author of 11 novels, she won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993, having published her first novel, The Bluest Eye, in 1970. Her 1987 book Beloved told the story of a runaway female slave and was made into a film starring Oprah Winfrey in 1998.
Morrison once said:
"We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives."