A vital new non-fiction collection from one of the most celebrated and revered writers of our time'We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.' The Nobel Lecture in Literature, 1993The power of language, discussed beautifully in Toni Morrison's Nobel lecture, is felt throughout the essays, speeches and meditations contained in this collection. With controlled anger, elegance, and literary excellence, Morrison's words interrogate the world around us, considering race, gender, and globalisation. Heart-stoppingly introduced by a prayer for the dead of 9/11, a meditation on Martin Luther King Jr. and a eulogy for James Baldwin, this collection addresses audiences ranging from graduating students to visitors to both the Louvre and America's Black Holocaust Museum. A Mouth Full of Blood is a powerful, erudite and essential gathering of ideas that speaks to us all. 'These pieces are a wake-up call... [and] a brilliant insight into the mind and work of one of the world's finest writers' Anita Sethi, i'Mouth Full of Blood is a bracing reminder of what words do, how carefully they should and can be used... magnificent [and] rigorously argued' RO Kwon, Guardian