“There’s nothing inside that’s 81. It’s just the changes in the body. And the memory. I don’t remember where the keys are. Or as my son says, ‘Ma, it’s not that you don’t remember where you put the keys, it’s when you pick up your keys and you don’t know what they’re for.’ Thank you, son.” She laughs long and loud. “Everything that happened in the first 50 years of my life is dazzling and memorable. It’s amazing, how the past is so clear. And the present is…” She bats a hand in the air.

from an interview Morrison did in The Guardian.

I hadn’t known that Toni Morrison was a pen name- her given name is Chloe Wofford.