Hey, it's Empire's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbong. So in our return to school week,

we're going to cheat a bit with today's interview. But I think it's worth it because it is an

interview with Tony Morrison, who wrote Beloved Sula, the Blueest Eye, and on and on and on. Essentially,

you could make the argument that no high school reading list is complete

without at least one of Morrison's books on it. In 2004, NPR's Renee Montaigne visited Morrison

in her New York City apartment to talk about a new paperback re-release of her books. And for

these additions, she had to write new forwards for her books. And Morrison talked about how it felt revisiting her own work.

And wouldn't you know, even Tony Morrison herself learned something from reading Tony Morrison.

That's ahead.

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When it came to accepting her Nobel Prize 11 years ago,

Tony Morrison conjured up her ancestors, the literary ones,

to the glittering assembly in Stockholm's Grand City Hall.

She began,

I entered this hall pleasantly haunted by those who have entered it

before me. When I sit down with Tony Morrison in her Manhattan apartment, I ask her what she meant

by pleasantly haunted. I think of ghosts and haunting as just being alert.

...