Interview with Cheri Campbell
"When we have a loving and caring family while cultivating a supportive community, we can be our best selves, just like Toni Morrison exemplifies."
Interview Introduction:
Cheri Campbell's official title is "Adult Services Librarian" at the main branch of the Lorain Public Library. However, she is better known for her expertise on Toni Morrison. Since she began working at the Library in 1990, Ms. Campbell has helped numerous scholars (such as Namwali Serpell and Farah Jasmine Griffin), film producers (including Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, who created the PBS documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am), biographers, teachers, and students. She guides whoever steps into the Library's Toni Morrison Reading Room, which was created in 1995 to honor the writer's legacy, two years after Morrison received the Nobel Prize in Literature.
She would humbly say that she simply does what a librarian should do. But once anyone talks with her, it is impossible not to recognize her extensive knowledge of Toni Morrison and her profound affection for the writer's work. Ms. Campbell not only helps people learn about the Library's history with Toni Morrison but also helps them enjoy what the writer herself might have dreamed of—a place "where people can sit and read and just think."
This interview was conducted in the Lorain Public Library's Toni Morrison Reading Room on July 21, 2026.
