Thread by @monaeltahawy

The magnificent Nina Simone would have been 90 years old today. My love for her is boundless. Throughout the day I will share some of my favourite things that #NinaSaid for my annual appreciation and respect 💜✊🏽❤️ (Jack Robinson/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

“I’ll tell you what freedom is to me: no fear!” #NinaSaid

https://twitter.com/monaeltahawy/status/1230878772917874690/vid

In a 1999 episode of BBC HARDtalk, Tim Sebastian asked Nina Simone “Tell me about music as a political weapon.” Here’s what #NinaSaid

Asked “So you sing from anger?” #NinaSaid “I sing from intelligence.” Read 👇🏽

On her friendship with playwright Lorraine Hansberry, #NinaSaid: “Lorraine started off my political education, and through her I started thinking about myself as a Black person in a country run by white people and a woman in a world run by men.” lithub.com/young-gifted-a…

Sept 15, 1963, a bomb killed 4 young Black girls Birmingham, AL. #NinaSaid “I had it in my mind to go out and kill someone...I didn’t yet know who, but someone I could identify as being in the way of my people.” She wrote Mississippi Goddam in an hour newyorker.com/magazine/2014/…

She wrote Mississippi Goddam in an hour #NinaSaid

“When they killed those children is when I said ‘I have to start using my talent to help Black people...When they killed those little girls in Alabama, that’s when I changed,” #NinaSaid

In the mid-1960s Vernon Jordan, the head of the Urban League, asked Nina Simone how come she wasn’t ‘more active in civil rights’.
“Motherfucker, I am civil rights,” lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v38/…

“The first time I wore my hair African was after Pastel Blues...It reflected black pride, and that’s when I changed it. I identified a lot with Africa, and learned what they did, and started wearing my hair in an Afro,” #NinaSaid issuu.com/publishingscot…

“All my songs, the important ones, have razor cuts, I call them, at the end. I cut you, I make you think and it’s immediate... When any Black woman hears that song, she either starts crying or she wants to go out and kill somebody,” #NinaSaid about her song Four Women

Happy Born Day, Nina!

Nina Simone is revolution!

What an incredible legacy she left us.

I am spending today listening to and celebrating her and what #NinaSaid.

What are your favourite #NinaSimone songs?

As you listen to #NinaSimone songs today, take 8 minutes to watch this clip from BBC Hard Talk to see some of what #NinaSaid to Tim Sebastian in 1999. Nina died four years later.

And I realise the very first video way up there didn’t post properly so here it is:

“I’ll tell you what freedom is: no fear!” #NinaSaid

I post this #NjnaSaid thread every year to celebrate Nina Simone.

Thank you all who share it.

And all who share their favourite Nina songs.

Spending the day listening to her magnificence 💜✊🏽❤️