Goodness: Altruism and the Literary Imagination 

Morrison: "Evil has vivid speech, and goodness bites its tongue." A consideration of goodness in literature.

As inherently brilliant in concept, observation and descriptive as the writer herself. Toni Morrison has been my literary hero from the time I called myself an "adult", yet it is with childlike wonder and enthusiasm that I absorb her every word. I aspire to her wisdom and grace as I age.

Tony Morrison was a phenomenon in world literature ! She served us all with her excellent literature and works. We all love her......

Love Toni Morrison. Thought provoking, intellectually and culturally relevant voice.

This is a brilliant, wonderful, legendary woman💜 RIP Queen🕊

She's so eloquently, deep.

Awesome video, but I'm fascinated that someone had to introduce the person who is introducing the person who is introducing the speaker, whom everyone already knew anyway. Do they teach restraint at Harvard Div School?

I loved the way she ended her speech -- on the acquisition of self-knowledge. Thank you for sharing this insightful video.

Thank you Davíd for making this speech possible and bringing it to your students.

words bringing stand up attention to one's psyche coaxing permanent understanding of what is being said.

It took the white people until 13:48 to get to the talent. Wow.

Mother love me keep me warm Mother loves me, keeps me warm, nurtures me, cares for me, and calms me through the storm. To help me mother, help your baby to be strong, nothing more. No Money, is A Mercy, can The Bluest Eye find a Rainbow a Home? For Frank and his Sister here's a poem. I love you, Mother, I thank you everyday, love me, keep me warm, nurture me, care for me, show me what is right and wrong. Your love has kept me, in the light, words that make a man cave bright. And when I go to her at night, she rocks me in my cradle, so I sleep tight. I love you Mother. I Thank you everyday. Mother loves me, keeps me warm, nurtures me, cares for me, and calms me through the storm. To help me Mother, help your baby, to be strong, nothing more. Thank you Toni, for I've been torn, and my mother left me in the storm. By Eddie Campagnola Edward Campagnola, "Directions to the Dumpster" & Pen name "One Directions to Mercy Street"

Ms. Morrison began her lecture with the story of the Amish school shooting in Pennsylvania. This video was published the day of the Sandy Hook shooting in Connecticut. :(

The subtitles are KILLING me.

Interesting, sad, troublesome; She speaks truth here..

Is that a fedora Ms Morrison is wearing? She's so cool......a genius.

14:13 accolades over; she can finally speak --------------------------------------- 1. Amish community school murder of 10 girls, 9 to 13 'The Amish Community forgave the killer. They visited and comforted the killer's widow and children just as they embraced the families of the slain.' 'They said it was god's place to judge... do not think evil of this man... they quietly buried their dead...tore down the old school house and built a new one' 'The most extraordinary element was their silence 👍 their refusal to be lionesses, televised' 👏 👏 👏 🤔 💭 🤔 💭 🤔 --------------------------------------- 2. Research on the term goodness; then the term altruism 'Alter, other... narrow ... interpretation... A. 🤔 not instinctive B. 🤔 narcissism C. 🤔 an embedded gene 🤔 ... in service to the colony, the swarm... replicated in humans... sacrifice for kin... inate...in our genes --------------------------------------- 3. 🤔 evil 😈 'Why is it so worshipped?' 👏 👏 👏 👏 👏 👏 👏 👏 👏 👏 'Goodness always seems to be anticipated as weakness' 👍 😔 'Evil has a block buster audience; goodness lurks backstage' 👍 😔 '... the role goodness plays in 19th century fiction 🤔 ... ending is almost always triumph of goodness over evil 🤔 'The term.hero nowadays limited to the sacrificing death' 😔 'evil grabs the intellectual platform and all the energy' 😔 'goodness sits in the audience and watches, assuming it even has a ticket to the show' 😔 'striking goodness down with a well-honed literary axe' ... [various 20th century American male writers] masters at exposing the frailty... the comedy of goodness' 😈 👿 😈 --------------------------------------- 4. Goodness in her literature A. 🤔 learned goodness B. 🤔 as narcissism C. 🤔 instinctive kin protection A. 'in 'Mercy', there is a priest who teaches black girls to read and write... [at the time, any 'white' person doing so was] confined in jail... and fined... and some of them were simply lashed... that text was in criminal law as late as 1848' 41:33 🤔 💭 🤔 to give dominion... to take dominion... to wrest dominion ... [as my writing and self matured/learnt/grew, I became] 'more and more invested in making sure acts of goodness are like the Amish community blessed' 🥳🎉 🪅🎊 ❤ 💙💜💖 'such acts must have a strong impact on the novel's structure and its meaning' ❤ 💙 💜 💖 💗 💘 'expressions of goodness are never trivial...or incidental' ❤ 💙 💜 💖 💗 💘 'none of these expressions be handled as comedy or irony ❤ and they are seldom mute' ❤ 'allowing goodness ❤ its own speech ❤ does not annihilate evil.but it does allow me to signify my own understanding of goodness: the acquisition of self-knowledge; the ending for me is when the protagonist learns something vital and moral insightful and mature ' ❤ 💙 💜 💖 💗 💘 'I even think ... the land ofthe entire country was hostile' 😔 'this soil is bad for certain kinds of flowers' 💐 'and we aquiese and say the victim had no right to live' 😈 'such insight has nothing to do with winning' 👏 👏 👏 'language to do with moral clarity - with goodness' 👏 👏 👏 ❤ 💙 💜 💖 💗 💘

14:15

14:15 By not legally suiting the assassin, the Amish community she mentionned is perpetrating this kind of actions. Thanks to people that defined in details the nature of crimes and denounced them, we have laws, a system to garantee a protection etc... Acting this way, this Amish community only thought about their principles since they dont think it is their role to judge and punish. They had no interest in adding a brick to what the rest of the communities built, a system that they themselves are taking advantage of.

To go as far as to petty pet the family, I think it was their way of passive agressively having their justice and to me that's dirty. They could've just say their peice and walked away if their so righteous.

Hilarious.

I love this lady, and hang upon her words, but I must admit, she got her loose biology lesson as it were very wrong indeed. In short, 'selfish genes create selfless vessels,' it is not that the selfish gene makes people selfish, as it were. A common misunderstanding, but there it is.

That thumbnail is atrocious and disrespectful.