When it comes to Black History Month, one has to discuss the plethora of black literature and its significance in today’s world. When we talk about studying history of black people and empowering them, it becomes crucial to prioritise THEIR voice over voices claiming to speak for them. Their experiences, their perspective should be on the forefront. Authors, poets and artists play this crucial role of articulating black voices.

One of such impeccable authors was Nobel Laureate, Toni Morrison. She wrote extensively about racial prejudice in America and came to be known as the “conscience of America”.

In one of her interviews with The Guardian, she talked about labels - Most writers claim to abhor labels but Morrison has always welcomed the term “black writer”. “I’m writing for black people,” she says, “in the same way that Tolstoy was not writing for me, a 14-year-old coloured girl from Lorain, Ohio. I don’t have to apologise or consider myself limited because I don’t [write about white people] – which is not absolutely true, there are lots of white people in my books. The point is not having the white critic sit on your shoulder and approve it” – she refers to the writer James Baldwin talking about “a little white man deep inside of all of us”. Did she exorcise hers? “Well I never really had it. I just never did.”